2014 – a Summary

It’s the penultimate day of 2014, which seems as good a day as any to look back over 2014.

I’ve been using the Rheumatrack App on my phone since October 2013, which means that, for the first time ever, I can look back on the year and have a realistic idea of how much PR has affected me.

The good thing about using an app like this is that you can export all the data – within a specified time frame – as a file, so it means I can get a good overview and even do a little bit of analysis.

On the app, I record my pain on a scale of 0 – 100. I also record where in the body I’m in pain and sometimes I add notes too. Most days, I enter the data in the early evening, but sometimes, if the pain changes (dramatically increases or decreases) there will be multiple entries on the same day.  I record something even if there is so flaring at all.

The year in Numbers

So, time for some geekery as I look at 2014 in numbers. There were 355 entries in total.

• 173 records out of 355 were COMPLETELY PAIN FREE! That’s almost half!  (48%). I’m pretty sure that is higher than it would have been in previous years.
• 89 of the records were values of 30 or less. That means that for a quarter of the time, I am not in much pain at all.

Adding them both up, this means, that ¾ of the time, I’ve been in no or neglible pain. I’d say that was a pretty good result.

• I had NO flare ups where the pain was higher than 85 (it’s at about 80 and above that I am crying in pain and can’t really function well at all) and only 24 days where the pain was higher than 65/100. this is only 6% of the time.
• Which leaves 21% of the time – (1/5^th) I was in some sort of uncomfortable pain, but could still function.

I had the longest run of pain in the early part of the year while there was a lot of stress going on in the house due to building work: 42 entries over February 14^th til the 25^th March. I had a long run again in the summer – 27 entries 19^th July – 14^th August. I wasn’t particularly stressed and can’t pinpoint anything to that particular run.

I had quite a few nice spells with no pain at all, with the longest being 17 completely pain free days in a row in May (4^th til 22^nd). This was also during and straight after my detox retreat in Spain. This may or may not be a coincidence.

Where do you flare?

Most of the flares in the early part of the year were persistent in my elbow and shoulder. Most common areas for flares continue to be somewhere on the hand – wrist, base of the thumb, or any of the finger joints. My toes are rarely afflicted, but they have flared once or twice. I had a jaw flare twice. My knees have been troubling me off and on, but it seems that this may be down to tendonitis. I’m waiting for a physio appointment to assess this further

What I have not recorded in the app much is my fatigue or energy levels. I have three days of note where I was completely incapacited with fatigue.

Diet stuff

Overall, I do feel healthier at the moment, despite flaring from time to time. My energy seems more manageable, my mood more stable and my ability to cope with my PR much higher than it has ever been. I’ve been gluten-free since April and have been sticking to a fairly ‘clean’ alkaline type diet about 80% of the time. I notice that when I eat more sugary things, my mood and energy levels are both affected. I’m pretty committed to this new way of eating – which is just a stricter and healthier version of the mostly vegetarian diet I had already been following. But now, I eat less dairy, no gluten, and cook a lot more from scratch than ever before.

What about exercise?

I have done very very well when it comes to exercise this past year. I have definitely found that a daily morning yoga practice with my energy levels, as well as alleviating the morning muscular aches and pains I have, possibly from the fibromyalgia. I did an amazing fitness bootcamp in March and completely surprised myself with what my body could handle. And I have continued to fit in various exercise classes into my working week. In May, I got a new job working for Manchester Mind, and I enjoy it a lot. What’s also great is that I am able to fit in my lifestyle around it – continuing with my twice weekly zumba classes and working my hours over 3 days instead of 2 1/2. As part of the job, I had to visit a lot of people around Manchester and so over the summer, cycled about 70 miles a month JUST FOR WORK!  I also did a 26- mile sponsored cycle ride and raised over £400 for Refugee Action.

Since I decided to prioritise my yoga practice first thing, my meditation practice has taken a bit of a back seat. There isn’t enough time to fit in both yoga and meditation every day in the morning, so in the days when I’ve not been able to do both, I tend to meditate right before sleeping.

Looking after my Mind is important too

During 2014, I also learned to lead others in meditation on the Breathworks course learning to teach Mindfulness for Health. I felt hugely self-conscious the first time I led a meditation. Previously I’d just read it off a script or played something on the Ipad when I’d led meditations before. I still feel a little self-conscious, but I’m getting more confident simultaneously meditating and leading. I also got such great feedback on the last course I ran (I run 6-week long stress management and emotional wellbeing courses for people with diabetes and heart disease) that my confidence has really been boosted in that area. My meditation practice has really been life changing and it really does help me cope when things are tough.

Looking ahead

I’ve got a bunch of goals and hopes for 2015, but my main one is to continue with everything I’ve been doing that helps my health – so that means sticking with the alkaline diet, keeping exercising and doing yoga as well as meditating too. I have two yoga retreats booked – a weekend one in March, and a week-long retreat in Morocco in May, which I’m very much looking forward to.

Of course, one of my hopes is that there will be many pain-free days ahead, and fewer ones full of pain, but at the end of the day, that is something that I’m not completely in control of. I really hope that sticking with my healthy lifestyle over a long period of time might mean fewer and fewer flares. I can live in hope. But I also know that my healthy lifestyle helps me cope better with pain and fatigue so even if it doesn’t ‘cure’ me, it certainly helps me live better and be happier.

Happy 2015! Thank you for reading.

 

November News

It’s been a while since I last wrote, and happily, the summer flares that plagued me throughout July and August have subsided, and I’ve had a pretty calm Autumn.

Just after I wrote my last post, I saw a rheumatologist who ordered a whole raft of blood tests – five vials full! I got the results through my GP surgery, but they couldn’t make head nor tail of them as they hadn’t ordered them (!). My vitamin D levels seem pretty low – which given I take supplements AND I had been outdoors a lot in the summer, seems worrying to me. Neither the GP nor the rheumatologist thought it was worth taking any action on. Other levels are mostly normal, except for one marker that the rheumatologist said was consistent with inflammatory arthritis. Clearly, if he isn’t worried, then I shouldn’t be.

The main thing that came out of that appointment was a diagnosis of something new. Fibromyalgia. It was quite upsetting at first – getting a label of another chronic condition on top of the one I already have. Particularly as Fibromyalgia appears to be little understood and some medical professionals don’t even believe in it. But as my mum said, I’m already living with the symptoms, so getting the diagnosis shouldn’t really make much difference, particularly as there aren’t really any decent treatment options that seem to be appropriate for me.

The diagnosis has helped in some ways. It explains why my neck and back can be incredibly painful, despite the amount of physio I’ve had, and regular pilates and yoga that I do. It also explains why, when I don’t do any exercise, I feel like I have fewer spoons (and less energy) than when I do. My funny symptoms – the ones like my skin feeling sunburned or super sensitive, could also be down to fibro. So it’s good to finally get an explanation for that.

Since my last blog, I’ve had gluten twice. Both were small amounts and on both occasions, I was convinced that it would be fine, and it was too little to make a difference. After the first time, I had a three day flare that was pretty bad and painful – more so than anything I’d had for a long while. The day after the second occasion, I felt totally out of spoons and full of brain fog.

Coincidence or caused by the gluten? It’s difficult to know, but both incidences are enough to persuade me that it’s worth staying off gluten. I do feel as if I have more energy without it and I’m still eating healthier.

Since September, I’ve also been doing a daily morning yoga practice (just 15 minutes if I’m short of time, 30 if I’m not) on top of my meditation. The yoga is helping with general stiffness and pain, and is good for my energy levels too. It’s the first thing I do when I wake up, and it’s a great way to start the day. I’ve got a bunch of asanas that I like, but before I felt confident in self-practice, I used some online videos, including some from a website called Do Yoga With Me and the  30-day yoga challenge by Erin Motz

As far as my diet goes, I’ve got even stricter with what I eat and don’t eat. So, as well as totally avoiding gluten, I’m mostly avoiding dairy (mainly having goat’s or sheep’s dairy if I’m going to have any), still largely avoiding refined sugar, – (refined anything actually), avoiding additives and processed food and making as much food from scratch as I can. I don’t eat meat – but that’s not a new thing.

I’ve mainly been following recipes from Honestly Healthy  which recommends an ‘alkaline’ diet (which I guess is what I’m following). I have two Honestly Healthy cookbooks, which are great. I’ve also got a few nice recipes from Deliciously Ella.  Both are good sources of vegetarian, dairy free, gluten and sugar free recipes.

I also went back on a detox retreat, run by Olive in Spain. It was the second time I’d been and was as wonderful as the first time, which I reviewed for Queen of Retreats. I came back bouncing with energy (as I had done the time before).

The retreat reinforced the path I’m currently taking, and so I want to be as disciplined as possible, as far as I can. Hence the ‘mostly’ and the ‘largely’ when it comes to dairy and sugar. It goes without saying that I’m not drinking a lot of alcohol, and I’ve even cut down on coffee. So far, I’m pretty positive. I still get flares but they seem to be shorter lived, and I’m still having long periods of no pain (two weeks and counting currently).  My energy remains pretty good overall too.

The biggest challenge to the whole diet thing remains (as it was in August), eating out. That, and occasions where everyone brings in cake that I can’t eat.  This means that I imagine that the upcoming festive season is going to pose the biggest challenge yet. But I plan on making lots of lovely GF/Vegan/sugar free treats so that I don’t feel too left out.

If you want to know more about the types of food I’m cooking and eating, you can follow me on Instagram where I’ll post occasional photos.

Thanks for reading. : )

Some of the delicious meals served at Olive Retreat

Desserts at Olive Retreat: Sugar, gluten, dairy free.

Going gluten free

On the palindromic rheumatism facebook group, there are often posts from people wondering whether there is any link between diet and their symptoms. I’ve written about this before, and have never really been convinced that my flare ups relate to any particular food or food groups. I tried keeping a food diary, but there was no conclusive results in two months and so I just stopped doing it as it got really tedious! Eighteen months ago I drastically cut down on sugar, in the hope that it could be a culprit. It sort of helped my energy levels a little, but I didn’t think that it was a cause of any flares.

Yet on the facebook group, a number of people DO seem to feel that some foods do trigger their symptoms, though the foods themselves are not the same for everyone. Variously, they single out gluten, sugar, MSG, artificial sweeteners, tomatoes, and processed foods. Meanwhile, plenty of well-meaning people continue to advise me to give up various different foods, convinced that they are the cause of arthritic symptoms.  There also seem to be lots of people online talking about following an alkaline diet or the ‘paleo’ diet. I’m not so sure myself. The paleo diet seems to be very meat-based and as I haven’t eaten meat since 1990, it’s not something that appeals!

One of the things that comes up a LOT when people talk about diet and arthritis is avoiding gluten. But I’ve been quite resistant to giving it up. After all, gluten is in lots of foods, and I do really love bread and toast and so I’ve never really given it a go. I already avoid sugar, meat, various dairy products and follow a low-GI diet as much as I can. Do I really want to cut out another food group?

And yet…

When I was at the Apples & Pears fitness bootcamp, my symptoms completely disappeared. Even the flares that had been ‘stuck’ in joints for weeks and months went away. Part of me is convinced that this is down to the exercise getting rid of all the stress that had built up in my body after a bereavement and having builders in the house. But another part of me also wonders – could it be down to the fact that my gluten intake during that week was very low? Or could it be a combination of the two?

Even more confusingly, when I got home, I flared up within 24 hours of getting back. It could have be the stress of being back in a builder-infested house. Or, it could have been the slices of toast that I had the evening I arrived home.  So, I decided to cut out gluten and see what happens.

It’s been ten days now since those slices of toast. The returning home flare-up disappeared soon afterwards, and I have had quite a few more pain-free days with only very mild flare ups in my fingers after a very long day at work. It’s too early to draw any real conclusions. I’m going to have to stick with it for a couple of months and monitor symptoms during that time. If I haven’t flared by then, I’ll try reintroducing gluten and see whether it triggers anything.

Justin, my partner, reflected that this whole process was a win/win situation. Either gluten triggers my symptoms – in which case, I can control (to some extent) my condition by avoiding it. OR it doesn’t. In which case I can have toast and bread again! 🙂 Either way I win.

I am using rheumatrack, an app, to monitor my symptoms, so I will have something concrete to refer to at the end of the experiment.

So far, I haven’t found it too tricky, but I imagine it will get harder as time goes on. I know I’m going to have to be more prepared with my lunches and bringing food to events with me. Any suggestions, advice or good gluten free recipes welcome!

I promise to report back.