i'm slowly ever so slowly coming to terms with my recent rheumatoid arthritis diagnoses. i know i am lucky that it was caught early and that it won't impact my life too much. but i keep thinking oh god. i'm going to end up in a wheel chair. i had a teacher many years ago that had RA that ended up in a wheel chair. yes i know that is probably not going to happen to me, but it is still a huge fear. i absoutely hate limits. i can't stand the thought that there is something i either can't do or won't be able to do. i see this as a possible limit, just like i see my OCD as a limiter. i hate not knowing stuff. i love to learn. if i don't understand something in class or there is a topic i know nothing about it fustrates me. i guess i am the kind of person that wants to see and know it all just because i can. i really am worried that the rheumatoid arthritis will eventually phsycally limit me and that thought scares me. it is not an ocd thought just something that kinda lurks at the back of my head you know. it still hasn't totally sunk in it yet. although in this cold weather it is starting to sink in more and more. i stopped popping my joints but i noticed when i did that my hands started to hurt and my back and i am soooo stiff. i dunno if it is all in my head or it is real pain. kinda hard to tell at this point. but i did make a deal with my parents since water aerobics are outta the question (classes are too far) i asked them if i made straight A's this semester would they buy me a wii and the wii fit game. i figured it was low impact and it would be a good subsitute to the water aerobics. i'm trying to lose the weight and start low impact exercise. the one thing that has irritated me is ever since my mom found out i have RA it seems like she has been walking on eggs shells around me acting like i am going to break in half or shatter like i am made of fragile glass. i'm still the same just i have yet another label. my doctor and i had a good laugh about my health i'm probably health wise at least one of his more stranger paitents. i am absoutely healthy. but ever time i go in for a routine thing. something weird pops up on the radar when i was 14 years old i became so dehydrated by drinking too much water that i flushed my eletroyles out of my systems when i was exceriseing he did a blood test to make sure those levels were normal buuuuuut whoops i ended having extremely high cholesterol totally floored everyone because at the time i was underweight due to an extremely high metabolism and was pretty much perfectly healthy seeming. i have a genetic predisposion to producing too much LDL cholesterol which is the bad stuff while the other ones are totally normal. jump a head to 08 go in for my annual walk out with PCOS (poly cyctic ovary disease) again very few symptoms that didn't warrent too much worry i thought. annnnnnd then jump ahead to thursday go in for a test to just rule me out of having lupus surprise! i have rheumatoid arthritis. so we were in the exam room just chuckling about the medical "surprises" made a serious situation a little bit light hearted. since it actually is kinda funny when you look at it a certain way. i am actually very very healthy person. i just so happen to have familiail high cholesterol, rheumatoid arthritis, and PCOS. all of which were found out by total accident. i guess this proves that even if you are healthy things still could be lurking that still could be potential serious. i am just lucky everything was caught incredabily early and i have an amazing doctor that goes the extra mile when doing tests otherwise none of this would have been caught if he didn't.