Tag: Ankylosing spondylitis

This close -and my funny baby

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I came‘this close’ to crying in front of a plumber just now.

AS is a disease of pain. But you get flares where it’s like the whole world’s pain descends on you. That’s today. After a hellish night where it felt like I sweated all night and was therefore made cold when my nightie cooled down, only to get hot and sweaty again, I woke up to a morning of hell.

I do think the NSAID is helping. My elbow and peripheral joints haven’t been as bad. THEY haven’t kept me awake. But good lord, my hips and SI joints are screaming and yelling and screeching in pain. I ended up sending the behavioural optometrist a run down of things my poor angels are struggling with and how I’m therefore breaking their exercises down into smaller steps, and telling her how the exercises are hard on ME too. I can’t bend over and push and pull. It hurts. Kneeling to push and pull (a variation that has to be done on tiles to make them slide up and down) also is a killer. I explained that I have AS and it’s currently not under control. (To put it mildly.)

I gave the children their school work and went to my room and while asking a friend about their sibling, couldn’t take it anymore and wept, asking her to pray right at that moment. It’s not only the bone pain, but something the gynae did to me in order to test something. It’s a cluster duck (heh heh) of pain.

So, the plumber wanted to see me just as I was at my worst point, where I was in so much pain that I couldn’t hide it. So I hobbled off the bed, wiping tears away and hoped I could manage. He could obviously see the pain as he apologised for asking for me.

What about my “funny baby?”

We have a plan. When she doesn’t see me, Twin B is fine. She keeps herself busy and does her own thing. But if she thinks to come open my door or sees me, then it’s game over. I can’t finish my ironing or sweeping or whatever it is I’m doing in peace. She will grab my hand and take me to my closet and want me to pull things down for her. Some of which are markers that she will carry around after removing their lids. Yes, you can imagine the mess. So I try avoid that.

This time, she spotted a box their combined birthday gifts came in, and wanted it. So for the sake of peace, I brought it down. She removed some bath soap that was given, and because of the shape, thought it was toothpaste. She took me back to the kitchen and wanted me to bring her toothbrush down. (That’s how I knew she thought it was toothpaste.)

I took her back to my room, with her protesting all the way. I told her we’d wash her hands. She shouted in anger, “Wash!” And cried even more. But I took her anyway.

I picked her up and sat her on the side of the sink as she cried, turned on the tap, put the soap on her hand and boom, tears all gone! She was so happy! Totally in her element. I ended up having to put the hand towel over her lap as she was now wetting her skirt and leggings. Then she started splashing her face and ‘washing’ it. It was too cute! So much for those initial tears!❤️She also tried to drink the water by sucking at her fingers.

Eventually, we were both done and both happy. And she stayed happy for the next hour❤️

Guilt

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I’d started typing this on Facebook then changed my mind and came here…

Lack of lumbar mobility

I hated that when it was time to do seated stretches and toe touches specifically, I couldn’t anymore.

I didn’t think…I didn’t know…

This week, the new rheumatologist was the first one to use a tape measure to measure my spine as I tried to touch my toes. (Google says it’s Schober’s Test)

Except, for the first time ever, I couldn’t touch my toes when standing.

How can that be? I could touch them in January when I saw the first rheumatologist?

Today, I decided to see how exactly I am bending. I tried as hard as I could to touch my toes. And looked at my back in the mirror and got the shock of my life.

I tried to get lower but my spine hurt and I could not. My back refused to move any further down.

I looked like some guy with AS I’d seen who was trying to bend. His back was flat.
My back was flat!

And then the worst…

Because I’ve suspected for a long time that I passed this stupid disease onto my children, I went out to ask THEM to bend. We’ve (my oldest girl and I) always said Bk has it worst-if he has it.

Indeed, she was like me at her age of 17, still able to touch her toes.

But my boy, my sweet son who has complained of back pain besides the swollen fingers they’ve both been getting like I did as a teen, couldn’t.

This was his best. And the curve at the top of the spine there is worrying.

Of course, I’ve sent this photo to the rheumatologist’s rooms and asked for an appointment for him “just in case.” I told them how I’d rather be sure it’s NOTHING than to waste 12 years looking for help in the wrong places.

I found this new rheumatologist through my husband’s retired PA whose 75yr old husband also has AS and is slightly bent forward.
His 29 year old son also has it.

It’s one of those that does tend to run in the family.

As an adoptive mom, I will NOT mind if he chooses to save a child from the possibility of this painful disease and ONLY adopts.

Same with my daughter.

But first things first. We need to find out what it is.

I’ve just returned from asking them their plans for building a family. It turns out they’d already decided that they didn’t want to pass AS onto their children she had discussed how they’d only adopt.

Let’s hope their future partners- if they have any- will be as open. I certainly don’t mind not having bio grandchildren. Any grandchild is going to find a way into my heart, no matter how they get into my family.

Better Injection!

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I’m so, so thankful! Last week, I had that horrible reaction not even an hour after injecting myself. I brought the injection day forward so that I’d hopefully be ok by Sabbath – my poor middle two were extremely upset at not going to church.

I don’t get anything. No reaction. No welt. No diarrhea. No excruciating burning pain! Nothing! I don’t know what tomorrow will hold, but I know that today held ME!

AND I had a whole hour of no pain. I could not only tell my middle two what occupational therapy exercises to do for their core, but I joined in with them. My sweet eight year old asked in shock, “MOMMY!! What are you DOING!!??”

Priceless!

Enbrel number 3. Done and dusted. First time injecting into my belly. I’ll be better at it next time.

Yikes

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Injection number 2 was not as great as number 1. The meds stung going in, whereas the first time I didn’t feel the liquid at all. The welt was not as bad and the following day I didn’t swell there unlike last week.

But an hour later, I felt like a volcano. Sorry for the TMI but this just might help someone else who gets this reaction. They’ll know it’s not only them. Just under an hour after I injected myself, I needed the loo for a number two if you get my drift. But before I could get up from the loo, I felt this awful burning fire going up from my groin and making my belly feel like it will explode.

Fire spread up to my navel, then up to my sternum. I was in excruciating pain, I almost hobbled out to my son to ask him to take me to hospital. I’ve never felt that before. I was on fire inside. And the movement I had had was very loose. Sorry again…

I couldn’t bear the pain yet didn’t feel I should go to the hospital. I googled kf Enbrel can cause stomach problems and found this.

What would they do at hospital seeing as this was normal anyway? So I sent voice notes to maybe five people, and begged them to pray for me.

One told me my voice frightened them. A male. Another asked if I wasn’t sure I shouldn’t go to hospital. My mom in Zimbabwe-she felt utterly helpless and asked where my husband was.

Speaking of husband…He’d commented that it was my day to do my injection and asked if I was ready. I told him, “You know, I don’t know. I don’t know anymore. I need to try. But some with reactions get worse with each injection. What if it becomes worse than just the thigh issue and mild headache?”

Boy was I right! But I didn’t expect it at all! Not this! And here I am blogging two days later and my stomach isn’t doing great.

Time will tell…

It is HERE!

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It has been such a long wait! For something that I don’t even know will help! But, here it is. My Enbrel. After Discovery refused to find it because I’m not on the top two (read-most expensive) plans, we asked the doctor and nurse to proceed with an appeal (as they’d said the next step would be).

Next thing, I get a call from the rheumatologist’s offices saying that we’ll, an appeal would not work because of the plan I’m on.

“So, why? Why did we even begin the process if you already know the outcome? Why did you make me wait when you knew I was waiting for nothing!?” I wanted to scream.

But, I don’t scream.

She then proceeded to tell me about a cheaper drug than the Enbrel the doctor had said would be best to start with.

Again, my head spun. “Do you realize that none of you ever told me the cost anyway and you’ve always all assumed I won’t afford it? But if this is the best, then I might as well try! Plus it might not work anyway, or the side effects might be so awful that I’ll have to quit and try this other one. So, let’s just bring out the big guns before trying something less suitable. Why are you patronizing me by not giving me all the costs and siting for ME to tell you I can’t afford it?”

All this time, I’d been told by a patient that they are paying R5600 per injection. But when I asked for the cash price, it’s R5200 for the 50mg injection. (You can get a 25mg one but I was prescribed the larger dose.)

We can make a plan till next year. It will require lots of sacrifice in other areas, but it’s much less than I’d been told. So I told the office manager that we’d do it cash for now.

I don’t know. I just don’t like the way things have been done. The very first time I saw the doctor, she said we’d apply for the meds. And if they said no, we’d appeal, and then if no, apply for ex gratia funding from them.

Suddenly, all that has fallen by the wayside now that it’s time for her to write an appeal… I just don’t feel good. It’s like I was being fooled with empty promises. We’d already planned to take out a loan to fund treatment- don’t ask me how we’d repay! But they never asked. Just went an a path of assumptions and made me wait and fill in forms for no reason.

Oh well. Anyway! On Tuesday, I ordered the injections from Dis Chem and received the call saying they were there yesterday.

Having done IVF before, I know how to inject myself so I just asked the Enbrel nurse about what to expect.

1. If I have a skin reaction, no matter how mild it is, I should go to the pharmacy. If I ignore it, it maybe get much worse the next day and become a runaway fire.

I did get a minor reaction so I went.

Right now, it’s swollen but not red anymore. It’s a wider patch that has swollen than yesterday but no pain and itching.

2. I might get a headache.

I woke up with one but my life is a mess with sinusitis and hormone issues so who knows. Either way, it’s a very mild headache.

3. Extreme fatigue

I’m starting to feel it now, 21 hours later.

4. Some people said they don’t feel like themselves.

I feel like me. So far…

So, we wait and pray and hope. Not only for it to work and to work quickly, but for the windows of heaven to shower us so we can afford all our expenses. I know He is faithful. Two friends have sacrificed a lot already without even knowing how bad things are-one all the way in east Africa! I’m already going to cancel my pulmonologist visit due to low funds. We can’t do it all. Unplanned glasses, vision therapy, having to pay for the Enbrel ourselves, food, mortgage payments, my dad’s electricity, son’s driving lessons and car hire for the test.

Let’s see, people.

Watching..and praying.🙏🏾

Stand Up and Be Counted

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There’s seemingly only one group in my country that deals with AS. It’s run by a leader who I’ll liken to Chairman Mao. She’s only nice to you if you belong to her ‘communist’ party, if you’re not a communist like her, too bad, you’re on your own.

Not good.

I posted in an international forum and the only answer I got was basically impossible to do here in Africa.

So, in this Facebook group run by Chairman Mao, people post asking about the cost of Consentyx, Enbrel or whatever biologic they’re going to be put on. Far as I know, biologics are medication, right?

But let’s back up a bit. I joined a WhatsApp group that was for my specific province. I asked a question about my eye- when it turned out I had scleritis. I got maybe two answers max. Only one answer was that I should see a doctor. (I’d asked if I should relax because it’s pink eye, or if it’s one of the eye afflictions we tend to have as AS warriors. I’d never had pink eye before so I didn’t know if my symptoms were it or something else. )I felt so ignored, unseen. It was lonely…Support groups are meant to support you.

The very next week, someone asked the same question. Someone who is closer to being communist than I am. The answers poured in, showing lots of concern and telling her to hurry and go to the doctor quickly “because you can’t mess with your eyes. It can go bad very quickly.”

I should have left. I should have left. But I thought maybe I was seeing an issue where there wasn’t.

I know, that was too optimistic of me.🤦🏾‍♀️

A few weeks later, I shared a photo of myself wearing my AS warrior top. A few people asked where I got it. Given the group is ALLEGEDLY all about spreading awareness, I cheerfully shared the number and name of the person who did the printing.

Chairman Mao responded with a, “Do not use this group for advertising.”

That time, I DID leave. It was her tone, like I’m some naughty child. And it was the fact that they had been going on about spreading awareness and this was a tool for awareness

So, back to the Facebook group. A non communist like me joined the group yesterday. She said she’s on treatment but is struggling with terrible pain at night in specific joints and was asking what to do.

Nobody had answered yet when I saw her her question and responded to it. I told her that despite my being on Trepiline which supposedly also aids you with sleep, my sleep is extremely disturbed by pain so I can relate. I mentioned that I’m waiting to start biologics and asked what treatment she’s on. I ended with sympathy for her struggles.

I never received a response notification so I went back in to see why. She’d sounded pretty desperate after all. And I’d wanted to tell her that the med she’s on takes a while to start having an impact, or to tell her to ask her rheumatologist if there’s another option she can try. I just needed to know so we can hope it would yet take effect, or ask her rheumy for further help. It’s been quite a few months since diagnosis.

I realised why I hadn’t received a response to my comment. Chairman Mao had erased my response.

And she’d written that we must not discuss medication.

Do not discuss medication in a group talking about a disease? Excuse me?

And what??

I posted screenshots of where communists like her had spoken about medication, naming steroid injections, talking about Salazopyrin dosages etc.

My goodness, she’d made her communism so apparent.

And so, I left. I didn’t even wait to see what communist nonsense she’d spew to defend herself. I left.

And yes, by ‘her communism’ I mean her racism. I don’t see any other reason why I’d be ignored by a bunch of non Black people, while non Black people with the same problem get lots of support. Nor do I see why she’d only rap a Black person on the knuckles for something White people had been doing all along with no reprimanding.

And why not just issue her command without erasing my sympathetic comment? Was she wishing she could erase the new member and I too? That was the height of arrogance and rudeness. And lack of respect.

I remember sharing some thoughts from the group and my Black friend asking if it’s rare for Black people to have AS because not a single Black person had said anything.

Maybe Chairman Mao made the group so uncomfortable that many left. I’ll never know.

So here I am. All alone. Dealing with a rare disease and no support group.

Better that than to be belittled by some small woman with a large ego.

And I hope they do take my name off their register as I requested, they don’t represent me after all. If they did, one of them would have spoken up.

But they were all silent.

They are all complicit.

Silence is painful. I hope I speak up for anyone I come across who is being blatantly unfairly treated. I hope I never participate in the erasure of someone, but show them that I see them. I hear them. They matter.

Ankylosing Spondylitis is a BEAST

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Wearing masks because I don’t want to catch the virus ALL my children have.

I felt on top of the world yesterday. Granted I had way too many pain tablets to even count, but I felt on top of the world.. once they kicked in.

Today, I am paying for it. I am paying for it and I want to cry. I often had days before diagnosis when I’d tell my husband, “I can’t. I just can’t do this. I wish there was a nursing home that I could go to where I could sleep, be served food and sleep through the night-unlike a hospital where nurses and patients keep you awake at night. I want to be nurtured, mothered, looked after. I can’t do this. The pain and fatigue are too much. I wonder why.”

That’s the kind of day I’m having, I know why, and it’s only just past 8am.

The loud noise of the children’s shouting to each other from different rooms, my teen daughter’s very loud laugh all set my teeth on edge. I want to join in and just SCREAM as loud as I can. Shout that I need a break. But what would that hell except to frighten them? I want to be in a quiet place, resting my weary body.

I shouldn’t have been a hero yesterday. Moving my heavy queen size bed to clean under it, vacuuming and mopping multiple rooms, hanging laundry, bringing laundry in, hanging more laundry, ironing, working out…And daring to print practice exam papers and do dishes. It was too much for the me I am today. The me I will be until we try biologics AND they work.

For it’s still a long process. I don’t even know when I will be approved. I don’t know if we will afford it. And I don’t even know that the first attempt -Enbrel- will work. What I do know is that all my joints are screaming and I know the screaming is so loud that not all the pain meds in the world will bring the volume down to the level it was at yesterday. What I also fount out this morning I s that doing glute bridges hurts too-as well as some of the other AS specific exercises I’m meant to do.

What I do know is that I’m limping and nobody in my world knows how bad today is. And why should they? It’s not like they can come take the load off my painful, weary shoulders. And they know AS is forever. So, I come to my trusty online journal and share what many others are going through with their ailments.

We will survive -somehow. Don’t ask me how, as I hear my twins screaming and crying and want to join them instead of having to be the one to find the strength to sort it out.

Just breathe. The day is not infinite. Somehow we will find a moment of rest even if it’s right at the very end of it. And we will learn from yesterday to never try again to be the us we used to be before disease took over us.

Today, I have AS and AS has me. But it doesn’t change who I am. Weaker, slower, walking unevenly, silently crying but still holding on and being the me my children deserve. So help me God.

Where Do I Start?

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I had a wheeze. Then it became a cough. Then the GP did the X ray in Friday that had I posted that I would have but saw nothing. Her guess was that “the infection has not yet consolidated” so I must go on a second round of augmentin to stop it building it up.

I decided to NOT.

I knew I’d be seeing the pulmonologist and I hate meds at the best of times, to treat an invisible chest infection just didn’t sit right with me.

I went. I did the lung function tests and allergy tests. I’m no longer allergic to fur but I’m still allergic to dust. VERY allergic. So he told me to get rid of my children’s soft toys. I told him that would be impossible. So he then said I could keep one for each child, and freeze them for 5 hours once a week and someone else must then vacuum the dead dust mites off. I must also do some allergy spray for the rest of my life. 60 seconds with my head upside down so the spray goes where it should go.

Also, he could hear my cough but given my chest x rays were clear, he veered towards it being caused by a sinus infection. So he prescribed a ten day course of zinnat antibiotic. If I feel it’s not improving on day eight, I’m to go back to the pharmacy and add on a further five days.

He too can’t hear sound at the bottom of my right lung, and my lung capacity is reduced. And that’s where we worry… I must return in three weeks’ time and he will take a listen again. If it’s still off, he will send me for CT scans on my lungs and in my sinuses -my head. He fears it could be Ankylosing spondylitis impacting my lungs.

Speaking of AS. You know I’ve been waiting on tenterhooks for biologics. And you might know I emailed twice to ask what’s happening, last month. I was meant to have an appointment with the rheumatologist tomorrow but on Monday I got a text ‘confirming’ my appointment for next week. I phoned the next day to ask what that’s about, and they said my rheumy will be unavailable so they’ve moved my appointment. Thanks for DISCUSSING it with me and for checking that I’m available!! NOT!

Then a few hours later the admin phoned me back. “Well actually, the doctor has canceled your appointment. She wants you to have started your biologics first.”

Who said I didn’t have issues to discuss with her? Like, my lungs??

I asked, “Where are we with regards to that?”

My heart sank. She said they first have to submit the biologic application to SARAA which is a rheumatologist panel. Then if they approve, it will THEN go to my medical aid company for them to (not) approve! Guys, she has always said the next step was to submit to medical aid. Never did she mention this first one! I couldn’t believe it! I wanted to cry! How much longer am I meant to wait? The pain is increasing dramatically and my methods aren’t working anymore!

I ended the call.

Then I phoned back again. I told her I was in extreme pain and was there anything they could do for pain relief while waiting for biologics. She was shocked, “So you’re not on any pain medication? No NSAID??” I told her how the doctor took me off them at the end of May as they weren’t helping and my disease was progressing so no, I’ve been on NOTHING!

She said she would chat with the doctor and see if they could send me a script.

Then she phoned back. “Alright, these are the meds we will prescribe. Tramadol and StilPane. But you do realise these won’t slow the disease down, right? You do realise you need biologics for that?”

No kidding! Why else would I have emailed twice, and asked TODAY where we are in the process of getting them?? And my knowing doesn’t help. It’s not like the delay is because I’m not coming to pick my injections up!

I asked in a Facebook group about timing. Two replies said the panel has no set schedule and one of them said they are slow to meet. And they might need a certain number of cases before meeting to discuss.

I feel so helpless and abandoned. I finally got a diagnosis in January. But here I am in August with no treatment and no idea when I will start it.

And meanwhile, the disease continues to kill me slowly.

And this is PRIVATE HEALTHCARE!

I thought I’d be able to be the teacher and mom that I want to be. I thought the hiccup would be medical aid saying no and then when that would finally be sorted, the next hiccup would be it perhaps not working and needing to move onto a different biologic.

I didn’t know it would take unknown months to get nowhere.😭

Is Your Life this Crazy?

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Tomorrow is my daughter’s birthday. She turns 17.

On the 16th of this month, was my birthday. As I reflect on how I want my children to know we appreciate their lives..and on how I need to find cake, I thought of what my husband said on my birthday this year, given my mother no longer is alive.

“Well, at least I don’t have to worry about how she hasn’t wished you a happy birthday this year!”

Ouch! But it made me laugh out loud! True. Dead men tell no tales. Nor do they continue to make us feel less than. I didn’t realise what it meant for him over the years to get home from work, or be home with me and at the end of the day, ask me, “So, who phoned or texted to wish you a happy birthday?”

And have me reply, “Well, so and so did.”

Him, “Not your mom?

Me, “Man, I’d roll over and die of shock if she DID!”

I didn’t know it hurt him on my behalf till this year. It never registered. And I feel sad for HIM. His mother still wishes him a happy birthday and she has FIVE children. I am my mother’s first and she stopped probably a decade ago if not more. Probably around the time she accepted that I had adopted my children for life and was going to educate all my children myself.

Ouch.

But if I was in jail, and happened to steal from my job, she’d have visited me and wished me a happy birthday, happy anniversary and fair Sunday visit.

Believe me, I am sure of that. I just can’t tell you how.

So, I prepare to celebrate my daughter. To encourage her to follow God all her life. To implore her to live right and give us genuine reason not only to be grateful she was born, but to be happy she lives-by living a life of grace and kindness. That’s all I want.

And yes, if she landed up in jail, I’d visit her. But I’d be ‘upset’ about that and not if she adopted and remained a homeschool mom.

PS. I am scared. I had blood tests to check baseline numbers before my rheumatologist moves me onto a weekly biologic injection. And I saw that my kidney function is suddenly at stage 2 kidney disease. They say online not too see a nephrologist till stage 3. And I thought maybe it was due to the pain meds I started in December last year.

But then I went back to old blood results and found a few other kidney numbers and my function has been declining all along. Not only that, my creatinine (in rough terms -how much junk my kidneys are NOT able to filter out my blood) has been steadily increasing. 61, 64 and now 81. After 89, alarm bells start ringing in the medical field.

Given this is a trend and not just one set of bad numbers out of normal ones, I’ve decided to see a kidney guy next week.

Also, my right lung either has so much infection that it’s clogged up fully and has no space for air, or it has collapsed. I’m on antibiotics-sound familiar???-and must go back to the GP on Friday even if I feel better. My cough sounds like the cough of someone with COPD. A chronic lung disease.

I can’t explain the dismay I felt. She had been listening through the stethoscope over my vest (vest in South African, not American. The light underwear you wear when it’s cold.) But when she heard nothing, she got rid of it and my bra. And still-nothing. Seeing a worried doctor is not fun.

But I must say this. I’m thankful to a friend in Kenya. Last time, my friend’s daughter asked me, “Mum, why do you sound like you’ve been running? You know you’re meant to be resting after your op. Why do you sound too busy? You can’t even breathe!” But I did not do anything about it. I didn’t HEAR it. I was just walking. I shouldn’t have sounded so bad. I think though, I thought my body was reacting to the pain. Only when things got so bad that I couldn’t sleep for a few nights, did I see a doctor. and the doctor was angry at me for “waiting so long” to be seen.

This time, I was telling my friend via WhatsApp voice note on Friday, that I thought I had a chest infection as the symptoms were all piling up as usual, and when she wrote, “I can hear the lack of breath” I took it seriously this time. I saw the doctor on Monday. And I’m glad I did.

I return to the GP on Friday. Maybe for chest x-rays if things aren’t bad. I see pulmonologist on Monday who will do lung function tests as I need to figure out WHY it gets this bad. I see the rheumatologist on Thursday morning next week, who I hope will be able to start me on treatment as I had such a bad attack that despite oral and pain patches, I almost went to Emergency for the pain. And then that afternoon, I meet the neurologist who I assume will be aiming to keep an eye on my failing kidney (s). I had small cysts on both kidney and liver in 2020. Did they grow? Do I have Polycystic Kidney Disease? Is it AS related?

Can we halt the decline?

I hope so.

What’s Going On??

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Tomorrow I see the surgeon about whatever is going on post op, deep inside. Not the actual wound, but below. Started with a small big pea-sized lump and it’s now a huge area of pain. Well, as big as my hand. Woke me with a huge wallop this morning at 3am and is still aching badly. Literally felt as if something smashed me inside.

I’m scared. I’m scared of the costs of diagnosing the problem, and what will be entailed in fixing it.

I got a call from the rheumatologist’s rooms. The PA said that after long deliberations, I’ll be put on Enbrel. She had said she would send forms, but I haven’t received them. The next step will be to send motivation letter to medical aid.

I’m so scared. I looked up the costs. They are impossible! Google says you’ll inject yourself every week and that depending on the dosage in each injection, I’ll pay between R4300-9000 per jab! That’s weekly! No way I can do that! And my med aid plan is one of those that orders have 100% said didn’t even pay the 80% the more expensive plans pay.

I need this. I’m in so much pain that I can’t even do my AS exercises themselves. And the thought of it progressing without me at least slowing it down… I have my cane. But I want to have the opportunity to feel so well that I don’t have to use it.

When will my body cooperate?

Let’s hope the cause for the pain is diagnosable and fixable. In an affordable manner!

Next up-the red carpet funeral.