Went to the Dr. and the Dr. said…

All this time I thought that I was going backwards on my Sarcoidosis and it turns out that the soreness may be Gout! I never thought that I would be happy to have Gout but I really am! Gout is much easier to kick then Sarcoidosis (I think). So what we think right now is that I am still making great progress on my Sarcoid, enough that we are going to reduce the Prednisone in about 3 weeks! Yea! =)

So the Gout is red spots that seem to move around in different places on my feet, get worse with exercise and is worse in one foot than the other. It is also down in my toes. It appears that it is the Gout that fells better when I put cold on it. I feel really bad because someone else who had Sarcoid (Bonnie) tried the cold water and it made it worse! I guess this explains it. It wasn’t Sarcoid that the cold water was helping.

I think I have gotten through the worst of the kidney stones. It passed and I am getting back on my feet. I’m still not feeling good, but I think that is from the other infections I am fighting and the antibiotic I am taking says that it can make you not feel well. I’m on this antibiotic for 21 days, so I hope that the feeling of unwell is mainly from the infection and not the medicine. Have to wait and see.

At first it appeared that there may be a link between the kidney stones and the gout because both can be caused by uric acid. I had my blood tested for uric acid but it came up normal. This may be due to my massive increase in drinking water. This can flush uric acid from your body and lower the reading. We won’t know for sure until they analyze the kidney stone and see what it is made out of. I should hear back on this in a few weeks.

See, you never what’s going to happen, and many times we don’t even know what is going on when we think we do. Just got to keep smiling, pushing and believing that Heavenly Father is watching over us.

Michael

When life gives you lemons… kill kidney stones!

Today I was able to pass the bringer of pain (kidney stone), or at least part of it. I am still so amazing that something so small can cause so much pain! Mind you it was hard as nails and sharp as glass, but you can’t help asking yourself “Really? That’s it?” I have been cut wide open before, I have had nails go right through my foot, had serious tooth pain, slammed funny bones, I even smashed my pinky almost completely flat and yet this tiny little thing was the cause of the most intense long lasting pain I have ever felt. Amazing!

I have heard that drinking the juice from freshly lemons will help break down a kidney stone or even turn it into a substance like soft jelly bears. I had a kidney stone before, all be it much less painful, and drinking the lemon juice seemed to work, so I tried it again this time. The doctors have me using a strainer to catch the stone so that they can analyze it and hopefully find out what is causing them. When I caught a bunch of soft gummy stuff came with it and surrounded it in a coating. It appears that the lemon juice really works! I have decided that when I go out from now on I will be drinking lemon aid. Let’s see if this helps in the future.

By the way… how I was told to take the lemon juice was to squeeze ten lemons and then drink the juice straight. It’s a tough thing to do, but if you are good at gulping water down you can do it all in one shot. You will have a ton of funny and intense after tastes go through your mouth, but the results are really worth it. (At least in my opinion) Now I’m not a doctor and I don’t know how this will work for everyone, but it worked well for me. Oh… and if you do it, don’t forget to brush your teeth right away. Don’t want that acid on your teeth.

On the up side I have been having trouble getting my Sarcoidosis under control. Ever since I went down on my medications this last time I have not been able to get the redness and swelling to go away. I have just been fighting levels of inflammation. Well, since all of the problems with the kidney stone happened my Sarcoidosis has really shaped up and is under control! The swelling is gone! I don’t feel any pain, but that is probably because of the pain killers for the kidney stones. I don’t know if the additional medicine the doctors gave me for the stones has somehow helped the Sarcoidosis or if it is just that I have been on my back for three days. Regardless I have made some good progress.

I still haven’t seen my Sarcoidosis doctor yet. I had to reschedule with everything that has been happening. Hopefully I can get in and see him some time this week. For now it is just working at getting life back to normal. One great thing that came from all of this is that Sarcoidosis pain is NOTHING compared to the kidney stone pain! Somehow that makes the normal pain not hurt so much. ;)

Michael

Ps. Just for the record… her are the additional medications I am taking for a short while:

Flomax .4 MG 1 time per day (To help speed thing up with passing the stones

Percocet 7.5 MG as needed (For pain)

Nitrofurantn 100MG 1 time per day (Antibiotics. This is a long 21 day course for an infection I have.)

The pain was excruciating!

I just went through the worst 2 1/2 hours of my life! Nonstop brutal, gut wrenching, scream out loud and writhe on the ground pain that felt like my intestines had exploded and someone was slamming me in the… privets… with a sledge hammer. The emergency room gave me morphine, fentanyl (100 times more potent than morphine) and dilaudid in doses so high that they couldn’t give me any more without intibate me and it still didn’t take the pain away. I literally scream in agony almost the entire time. I know kidney stones are very painful, and I even had them before, but that was childes play compared to this. I don’t know what was different but the pain was excruciating!

The pain is under control now and I am doped up on drugs waiting for it to pass the rest of the way. The Doctors said that the rest of the way should be easier now. I sure hope so. For now it’s drink tons of water, keep the drugs in me and hope this NEVER happens again!

Michael

Imuran answers and OUCH!

I saw my pulmonologist a few days ago. I went to him to do a follow-up on my lungs and to see if he could give me more information on Imuran. I really like this doctor and would like to have him as my primary doctor, but he isn’t a rheumatologist. (Darn!) He is very willing to talk things through and does not feel that asking him questions is doubting his abilities. He always takes the time to make sure that all of my questions are answered to my satisfactions. I have to tell you, this builds way more trust for me than someone who says “If you question my decision maybe you should get a second opinion”.

He told me that although the Imuran sounds on paper like it is much worse than Prednisone people tend to tolerate the Imuran much better than the Prednisone. In his experience he has seen many more health problems from being on Prednisone than Imuran and strongly recommends using the Imuran to get off of the Prednisone as quickly as you can. I don’t know how this will all play out, but this has given me a lot more confidence in taking the Imuran.

I have been hurting a lot lately. The cold water has helped but it is only treating the symptoms, it isn’t doing anything for “fixing” the problem. The pain in my feet has migrated and moved around my feet. Sarcoidosis is strange that way. It has moved down into the area just behind my toes. I had an appointment with the rheumatologist on Friday to talk this over and see what could be done, but due to a mix-up the doctor took Friday off and I wasn’t notified. (Very frustrating) So I rescheduled for Tuesday, I’ll let you know how it goes.

Last night I think I missed taking 2.5 mgs of Prednisone of my daily 7.5 mgs. I woke up this morning hurting worse than I can ever remember hurting with Sarcoidosis. I have been considering going off of all medications and just dealing with the pain of Sarcoidosis, but days like this remind me how grateful I am for medications even if they do have side effects. I ended up having to take a Lortab that I had been prescribed to get through the pain until I was able to catch-up with my medications. I am also dealing with some UT problems that the doctors haven’t figured out yet. I think that this may be making the situation worse.

So… Stay on Imuran, get off Prednisone as quickly as I can, figure out the UT issues, meet with the doctor and see if we can get the rheumatoid issues under control. That’s the plan.

Michael