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Tuesday, May 3, 2011

Diagnosis.....

I am scared :( I've had a rash type mess on my face for about 3 or 4 weeks now. When I went in for my regular check-up my doctor indicated that she wanted to do blood work to try and see what was going on. There were several things that could be going on. I wasn't too worried at that point because I didn't know. I wasn't stressing about it. Today, the doctor called me, at work, to tell me that I have Lupus. Are you kidding me? My best friend, and her mom both have lupus. Her mom passed away from complications of lupus settling in her heart. Ugggh. Are you sure that I have it? I listened very closely to things she was telling me, and thankfully my doctor was speaking in normal people terms and not some big doctor terminology! One of the test that they had did (testing inflammation level) indicated that it was slightly elevated...which makes sense because I don't have a lot of pain in my joints. But, that may be a bad thing too because if it's attacking my organs than I probably wouldn't feel a lot of pain, right?
So....
Lupus is a chronic, autoimmune disease that can damage any part of the body (skin, joints, and/or organs inside the body). Chronic means that the signs and symptoms tend to last longer than six weeks and often for many years. In lupus, something goes wrong with your immune system, which is the part of the body that fights off viruses, bacteria, and germs ("foreign invaders," like the flu). Normally our immune system produces proteins called antibodies that protect the body from these invaders. Autoimmune means your immune system cannot tell the difference between these foreign invaders and your body’s healthy tissues ("auto" means "self") and creates autoantibodies that attack and destroy healthy tissue. These autoantibodies cause inflammation, pain, and damage in various parts of the body.
Please keep my family in your thoughts and prayers.

1 comments:

Lindsey Wood said...

So sorry to hear this! I know when you were as SSD you said they were doing more tests and you were waiting for the results. Keep us posted! My thoughts and prayers are with you and your family.

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