At age 22 while living in Mongolia I developed a severe chronic pain condition that effects every aspect of my life. Continuing this blog reminds me that life's challenges are stepping stones meant to lift us, not roadblocks meant to defeat us.

Saturday, February 20, 2010

real update!


Hey! I think we might actually have some idea about what this all is. We have ruled out about everything else, so we think that this really is what is wrong with me. My doctor was trying to decide what to do next and he remembered a patient who was a young girl and had a lot of bad, unexplained joint pain. They traced it back to a salmonella infection. He did a blood test to see if I had salmonella in mongolia, and it came back positive. There is apparently a rare complication of salmonella infection called reactive arthritis and reiter's syndrome. It causes inflammation of the joints and can inflame places where tendon attaches to bone and the vertebrae in the back. This could explain all of my symptoms and the time frame matches, so we think we have a positive diagnosis. Studies show people usually recover within a year. I have no idea what this means when it comes to trying to finish my mission, but it is very comforting to finally understand a little bit about what is going on ;) There are some medicines that can help and I will probably be starting those soon, so hopefully things will start going up from here!! yeah!! :)
ashley

I can't quite do this again yet, but hopefully I will be able to soon! ;)

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