What Doesn’t Kill You Makes You Stronger

I was a competitive swimmer through high school and joined a club swimming team in college, I had always been relatively athletic through most of my life. When I had trouble lifting myself out of the pool at practice, I thought it was a little strange, but maybe my wrists were sore from over exertion from practice. Then the fatigue began when I could hardly stay awake during class. But after awhile you just think of that as the new normal and life goes on. That summer when on a family vacation my feet started swelling and I was walking slower then my 84 year old grandfather. My mom, who got her RA diagnosis a couple years before, took me in to a Rheumatologist, even though we already knew what the diagnosis would be. My grandmother had it, my mom had it, and at 19 I had it too. Having a family history of it, the diagnosis was luckily pretty quick; I have heard of people having symptoms for a long time before getting a confirmed diagnosis.

As if getting a life changing diagnosis wasn’t bad enough, trying to find the right group of medication that works was worse. For people who do not know what Rheumatoid Arthritis (RA) is, it is an autoimmune disorder in where your immune system attacks the lining in your joints, causing permanent, irreversible damage. Because the part of our immune system that attacks our joints in some patients is different then others, some medications work better for some people then others. I spent the entire rest of my college experience with steroids, injections, immunosuppressants, and pain management drugs with little to no relief. I had such bad fatigue that I could hardly stay awake in class, and if I was able to make it through class, I would be too exhausted to do homework. This was even after getting 8+hours of sleep. I would have reactions from some medication where one day a week I was sick and had to stay in bed all day. They were dark times, but I had an incredible support system to keep me going.

Thankfully within the last decade since I got diagnosed I have graduated college, landed my dream career working with exotic animals, and have traveled around the world. While I would never wish this disease on my worst enemy, it has made me who I am, and I am pretty proud of her.