One part of RA is having great fluctuations in pain -- hourly, daily, weekly. For some, it is weather related, and fluctuations in temperature and humidity can trigger problems. Waking up and getting going is usually a torment due to excessive stiffness and pain all over that may go away as you get moving, or may hang around all day. The pain is like a tough muscle pull pain or a broken bone pain -- sometimes stabbing, shooting, aching, throbbing. Throughout every day there are areas of the body that are in significant pain -- hips, elbows, shoulders, neck, spine, knees, ankles, feet, toes, wrists, hands, fingers, even ribs. Thankfully it is not usually all at once. The demon of RA creeps around the body munching on the joints that it wants seemingly without logic.
The joints and surrounding tissues are inflamed and under attack, and the brain knows it. Anyone who has to deal with pain on a daily basis knows that there is also a condition known as "brain fog" that comes as a side order to many diseases that cause pain. The mind is a wee bit slower, less able to handle stress, and just feels like it is a few sips short of a pint. This is where drinking a pot of coffee before heading to work comes in for me! Today I found a good article from ABC News (How Chronic Pain Gets Into Your Head) that verifies that the brains of chronic pain patients have a different resource allocation than those living without. AS the article states, it is a "chicken or egg" situation -- is the activity in the brain responsible for the pain, or a result of it? Looking forward to more studies -- wouldn't it be great if they could flick a switch in the gray matter that would turn off the physical self-attack that RA causes?
Someday they might. If scientists can invent robotic dogs, interplanetary probes, and a way to create new organs on 3D printers, someone might figure this out. Until then, I will type my morning posts with three fingers and survive with more coffee than I really should be drinking. Cheers!