Just Started RA Treatment

I have only had RA symptoms for four months and been diagnosed for a shade over a month.

This diagnosis occured way too fast. I grew up around RA, since my grandmother had it as did my father and a few other relatives. I knew the symptoms and perhaps I was in denial willing to believe that that the fatigue, symmetrical hand swelling and stiffness was caused by hypothyroidism or somehow related to the ITP that I had in the late eighties. I had a positive anti-ccp and my physician told me that she was fairly sure that I had RA, but I believed that the rheumatologist would tell me that I had some malady that was more palatable for me.

I went to the rheumatologist, he examined me, looked at my blood work and told me that I have RA. That very day, I started methyltrexate and prednisone. The shock has worn off and I am beginning to accept the reality that I probably have RA and it may last for a while.