Hello, my name is Linnea. I am 34 years old, married with two kids, and have been suffering with chronic inflammatory pain and stiffness in my sacral joints for approximately 7 years. I have had several bad flare-ups of pain and stiffness that have left me unable to walk, the most recent of which I am just at the tail end of now.
I am currently under the care of a gastroenterologist, because I had two episodes of pain in my upper right abdominal area and back area, which was suspected to be gallstones because it was accompanied by nausea, constipation, gas and bloating. After two ultrasounds, a CT scan and numerous blood tests, it's clear that my gallbladder is not the cause of this pain.
I am starting to feel that there must be a link between the pain in my sacrum and this newer pain, which seems to be in the connection between my ribs and spine in the back, and ribs and sternum in the front.
Other symptoms I have are extreme tenderness in the bottoms of my heels, pain radiating from my sacrum into my buttocks but not down my legs, swelling and tenderness in the small joints of my fingers, numbness and tingling in my hands at night, and vitamin D deficiency (diagnosed along with depression).
A previous doctor examined me during a flare and thought I might have RA, but my blood test came back RF negative and "high normal" SED rate. He gave me a shot of Toradol, and a prescription for Plaquenil and Relafen. These seemed to help somewhat to ease the flare.
I have since switched insurance carriers a couple of times, and now I have to begin again the process of trying to get a doctor to help me figure out what's going on here. There is a lot of health history of auto-immune disorders in my family, including RA, Reynaud's, Sjogren's, and gout.
Tomorrow I go back in to see my gastro doc to discuss the results of my CT scan (which show that all of my organs are in perfectly good shape and should not be causing pain). I am nervous about broaching the topic of AS or USpA, because I fear that they will consider me to have "Google-itis" or be too intent on self-diagnosing. Honestly that's not the case - I'd rather rule it out than rule it in!! But I have a strong feeling that there's something definable and diagnosable going on here, and I can't continue to live in the kind of pain that I have been suffering.
I didn't mean to write a book... sorry for the long introduction! If you have any advice or words of comfort for someone just starting down the path of diagnosis... I'd gladly welcome them. I've been reading through the information and resources here and they have been very helpful to me.
