Friday: Attack of the giant ankle(s)

Here is a photo of last Friday’s very swollen ankles–especially the right one. Ouch. I have to say, the heat and humidity of summer in NYC is quickly becoming my enemy. Sitting at a desk all day at a temp job doesn’t help the swollen feet/ankles problem either. Luckily there is this wonderful little invention called ICE. After sitting on this step for a few minutes after work, dreading the rush hour subway ride back to Brooklyn from crazy Midtown, I did finally hoist myself up and limp down into the subway. As soon as I got home you can be sure that I strapped my ice pack onto that annoying ankle. I posted this photo on Facebook not long after I took it, complaining in a half-joking manner about how much I missed my pre-RA cute and skinny ankles (ankle bones even visible back then!). My cousin wrote back, “At least you’re wearing cute pants!” Yes, that’s true. Cute pants do help. Whatever makes things a little bit better, right?

So have a great day, stay cool, and wear some cute pants! Hang in there, everybody. Summer can be tough.

Friday

I’m so glad it’s Friday! This has been a long, stressful week. In bad news, my ankles and feet are still in rough shape and are very swollen and painful. I wound up going to the ER Tuesday night because I was kind of freaking out and didn’t want to wait for a doctor appointment. Thankfully all of the blood/urine tests came back normal. The doctor told me that she thinks I just have a random case of edema and she prescribed a diuretic for me to take for a week (Lasix). Today is Day 2 of taking the water pill and I don’t notice anything different. I also don’t feel like I’m having to go to the bathroom more often. So now I’m afraid that the swelling is from the RA. My rheumatologist’s nurse is supposed to be calling me back today about this. When I talked to her a few hours ago and explained what was going on, she didn’t seem to think that my swollen feet/ankles are from the RA. But who knows, right? Most of the time with this disease I can never get a certain answer or diagnosis which DRIVES ME CRAZY. It’s so maddening. I really hope this swelling problem gets sorted soon because I feel like I’m really on the verge of not being able to handle it. What that means, exactly, I don’t know – but I’m close to it.

In good news, my new glasses came in a couple days ago (which I am sporting in the above photo). They’re different than my old frames and a bit bigger, but I think I really like them. Change is hard for me sometimes – arthritis flare-ups, new illnesses, new jobs, new glasses. Stress! I keep trying to tell myself that change can be good. I probably look even more like a librarian in these specs, but that’s fine with me. Librarians are pretty awesome.

Ok, I better get back to “work.” Happy weekend!

Swollen

Both of my ankles are extremely swollen and I’m sitting here with a bag of frozen corn on the left ankle and an ice pack on the right one. The right ankle is especially huge, and I’m trying to not freak out. They’ve never been like this before, so it is worrying. And of course I made the stupid mistake of trying to find some information online. After typing “What causes swollen ankles?” into Google, I was immediately bombarded with a million posts warning of heart attacks, strokes, blood clots, lupus, kidney failure, etc. etc. So now of course I think I’m suffering from all of those afflictions (at once) and that I’m probably dying. Umm, anyway. I guess I will give this a couple days before going into any sort of panic mode. But once again I’m faced with the frustration of something going wrong with my body and not knowing if it’s from the RA or something else. I’ve learned how to deal with the “devil(s) I know,” but find myself feeling incredibly anxious and scared when something new and strange pops up. I really hate my body sometimes and all of the unnecessary worrying and pain it causes.

Well, on that note, my corn is thawing so I better dig in the freezer for some peas. I really hope this goes away soon.