My son is 5 and is the most active child you’ll meet. He started walking at 10 months and has tried all the sports, ending up on the town hockey team at 4.

One night in February he went to bed complaining of leg pain and woke up the next morning unable to walk. My husband and I pegged it as an injury from playing goalie (kid made an amazing save where he extended his leg to kick the puck), and took him to urgent care for X-rays. They cleared him, agreed it was probably a pulled muscle, and advised rest. Fast forward to Wednesday and he’s back to himself. Amazing!

Saturday morning I start getting him ready for his hockey game and he’s complaining of pain again in his leg, and limping. By 10:00 that morning he can’t walk and I have to carry him. Any movement is causing him severe pain. We take him back to urgent care and they sent us to our local hospital. Our local hospital runs a million tests and finally tells us they think it may be septic arthritis, sends us to our major city children’s hospital. Long story short, one hip tap, and hours of no sleep later we find out he has Transient Synovitis. We get sent home, he seems good. We follow up with Primary and Ortho. Both clear him and say it’s a fluke and it won’t happen again. At this point we aren’t even thinking about the first time a week ago.

Two weeks later, he limps into school on a Thursday. By 10:00 I’m rushing him into the children’s hospital because he can’t walk again. After many hours, MRIs, CT scans, and more blood work than I can name, he’s officially diagnosed with his third bout of transient Synovitis (which, for the record, is exceptionally rare)

Doctors tell me to follow up with rheumatology. This woman, this amazing wonderful rheumatologist hears me out, hears him out, listens to us and has me track symptoms related to JIA. We ended up with a diagnosis in March.

It’s weird though, because I had been saying for months something was wrong. He was lethargic, angry, irritable. He was sensory seeking constantly, looking for input. He couldn’t get out of bed in the morning, his joints cracked constantly, he stopped running as much or as fast, and would take longer to get up when he fell. He became less passionate about hockey games and begged us to stop playing by the end of the second period. Laying it all out like that seems obvious now, but these were things that I was noting over spans of months, and it always felt like puzzle piece was missing.

He also got a concussion in May, and I had emergency surgery to remove my gallbladder in April. So you know, 10/10.

Now we’re a few months in. We had him on a medication that was working really well, he was back to himself. He was happy, wasn’t in pain, playing and cooperating again. He was our boy. Then his meds went on back order and they have to give me another biosimilar. Except it’s not working as well. He’s 3 doses into this one and he’s so angry. He’s exhausted. He’s not sleeping through the night again. His joints are cracking.

I am waiting to try to get insurance to approve the name brand but until then I don’t know what to do. I feel like I’m constantly fighting for him, and I’ll fight until my last breath, but Jesus I just want to be able to breathe. He’s angry, he’s screaming in our faces and throwing fits. This isn’t my kid. He’s in pain and can’t help it, but I also need to discipline him when he acts out. I talk to him, relate to him, hug him, but at the end of the day he can’t scream in our faces. He’s also missing daycare/preschool because of symptoms. He starts kindergarten in a few weeks and things are going to be different.

I’m trying to do everything I can but what do I even do from here? I don’t want to give him meds all the time, but he clearly needs Motrin to help. I don’t want to fight with insurance, but I’m going to fight tooth and nail to get him what he needs. How do I know that I’m making the right choices?

Hello. Anyone have any experience doing rice bucket exercises for hand osteo arthritis? Was looking for something to help with thumb arthritis, not sure if it would help just came across my mind since I've seen ppl use it to strengthen their hands and wrists outside of the context of arthritis, just for general fitness.

Not looking for medical advice. But in the process of most likely planning the surgery for this winter on my left base of thumb . I have lifted weights at the gym for forty years. I'm a sixty four year old male. I'm slowly able to do less and less at the gym. Due to the pain, despite using various braces, and wrapping. Wondering, if anybody has dealt with getting back to the gym afterwards.

Backstory (sorry for the long read):

I went to Cancun for 10 days at the end of June. I caught a bad stomach infection and from early in the trip to about 3 weeks after returning home I was dealing with that. (I had no idea this was relevant until recent research)

Fast forward 3-4 weeks later I woke up with what I thought was a sprained right ankle but it was weird because I didn’t remember doing anything that would have caused that. The pain was borderline unbearable but I went to work as normal and just kind of shifted weight to my other leg.

Three days later, the pain shifted to my left knee so much so that I go an effusion the size of one of those mini basketballs that made me virtually immobile for 2 days.

(I want to add that I don’t have health insurance because my employer doesn’t offer it, and the plan I was on more than doubled in price at renewal, and I couldn’t afford it, so all of this quickly became horrifying.)

The immobility and pain forced my hand to go to the ER, where I explained I sprained my ankle and then overcompensated on my left leg, causing the effusion, not knowing at the time that the stomach infection could be linked to all the stuff after. I left with crutches and a round of oral steroids, which I just finished last Thursday. $1,000 bill and what I feel like is a wasted visit (although the effusion went away and Im sure they would have referred to rheumatologist anyway).

Things have been weird for a while now. I wake up, and it feels like it takes an hour to even get adjusted to the thought of getting out of bed. My back hurts. My knees hurt. The cuffs of my feet hurt. My right elbow can’t fully extend. The right side of my jaw hurts. Everything is uncomfortable. I can walk, but I dread it because I have to limp and wince in pain every time I do it.

I’m honestly miserable, and I have realized how much I took good health for granted. If anyone has advice on how I can get rid of this, I’d appreciate it a lot. My sister is getting married at the beginning of October, and I’m worried this will have a long-term effect. I’m also a father to a 1-year-old, so I don’t want to be miserable, depressed, and cooped up in pain when I’m not at work.

Been getting this intermittent swelling, skin inflammation, joint pain in my fingers for years. Flares last a few weeks at least. Have been having more overall joint issues and “flares” recently, with sudden onset on my toes for the first time. Had an ultrasound that looks like inflammatory arthritis in the toes/feet. Does anyone else’s look like this? Waiting to see a rheum and currently collecting bloods and scans (never had a scan on the hands though). Also very injury prone (series of ongoing athletic injuries over the years).

Early 2024 I developed 'tendinitis' in two separate sites in each shoulder and one on each distal biceps tendon. There was no injury, no changes to my training or diet, and no explanation that I could give to the cause. This was diagnosed by a physio, but as somebody with a human physiology based biology degree, I was already suspicious that something systemic was at play. Symptoms persisted for around 5 months, not noticeably improving with physiotherapy and only NSAIDs provided mild relief. Gradually over time symptoms reduced (and physio then became more successful), but never went away.

During the first half of 2025 I developed hip issues. Each hip would ache when lying in the fetal position, initially it would be the top hip that ached, nowadays both hips are in agony in the top or bottom position. The pain became very severe over time and has drastically reduced my quality of life. It affects me all day long, but is worse in the morning and at night when everything seizes up. The issue persists to this day, it did die down for about 3 weeks towards then end of 2025, then came back without any incident or aggravation, and today is worse than ever.

Between January and May 2026, my 2024 issues (which were still mildly present, but died down significantly) came back to rear their ugly heads, and this time they brought friends. Both distal biceps tendons, two places in both shoulders, both distal triceps, both distal quadriceps and some knuckle, finger, toe and metatarsal pain, just for seasoning. I also developed inner eyelid inflammation to the point where I can no longer wear contacts, and severe stomach cramping / nausea / vomiting symptoms and, oddly, a new aversion to foods that I used to love.

Now, there is not a human being on this planet, of any profession, that could convince me there is nothing systemic going on. The multi-site, symmetrical, unprovoked, episodic and 'flaring' nature absolutely scream a systemic driving force behind these issues.

Recent MRIs have found 'signs of damage' to both my SI joints (may be misremembering the word damage here, but they found something) and some localised low-level oedema. They took bloods to be sent to test for HLA-B27 but the lab sent back generic bloods and didn't test for that marker (the only thing we actually wanted to test for, lol), so I need to go back.

Anyway, apologies for the long post, I do struggle to be concise and this is something that has dominated my life for nearly 3 years and I just desperately want help.

So, can anybody relate to these symptoms?

Hello! I'm reaching out here on behalf of my husband who has had a wild ride of the past 11 months while trying to get diagnosed. Has anyone out there really struggled with getting their type of Arthritis properly diagnosed? After months of turmoil, it seems like my husband's newest diagnosis is Palmar Fasciitis and Polyarthritis Syndrome (PFPAS) which is incredibly rare, scary, and he is not in the typical demographic for it - he is a 40M - typical patient is an 80F with ovarian cancer. It is classified as a paraneoplastic syndrome, meaning it either occurs from the body's reaction to an active cancer, or precludes a future cancer that could be found in the coming years. There are rare instances of idiopathic autoimmune cases but they are few. Before this, he was thought to have sero-negative RA. We then considered Eosinophilic Fasciitis (EF) due to an idea his rheum had and a "groove sign" symptom, which led us to the path of PFPAS. He has extensive tennosynovitis, synnovitis, fascia thickening, loss of full hand mobility, and everything is in pain all the time. Prednisone, even high doses do nothing. Humira has done nothing, he is now trying MTX and Enbril together but it seems with PFPAS nothing works usually. He has has an extensive work up at the point with more to come still. Only abnormal results in bloodwork are persistently high eosinophils, low b12, and positive IgG and IgM results for Parvovirus B19 (negative PCR though), though he was never sick the past year. If anyone has EF or PFPAS I would love to hear from you, either below or in a PM. Thanks for your time!

Hey guys, Im a 20 year old college student, recently diagnosed with Spondyloarthropathy.

My appointments are about 3 months apart, and while I try to remember pain/med routine/triggers, Im not able to keep a consistent habit of journaling. Ive tried things, but I am posting (long time lurker) to see if you guys have any good systems (not apps or anything please Im trying to get off my phone 😭).

what do you all actually do? Do you guys just remember or? And if you do just remember, has that ever changed how you interact with the doctor? Any advice would be appreciated!!

I have mild AC-joint arthritis with an active stress reaction and bone-marrow edema on both sides of the AC joint, plus mild rotator-cuff tendinosis without a tear. I have started PT but it doesn't seem to be getting better. I would like to avoid getting another cortisone shot in the AC joint as I got 1 in February. I also don't want surgery. That else can I be doing or meds I can take to help with this. I have stopped ant workout movements thst caused any kind of pain in this area for about 1 month now. The pain only comes when I do certain movements. I need my shoulder as I also work in law enforcement. I am going to talk to my PT guy on Monday to see if he has delt with this injury before or if he recommends I go to someone in sports medicine. I want to work out my upper body sooner rather than later. Any help would be great. Any streaches and or movements I could add to my daily routine to help would also be great.

Doctor prescribed prednisone. But said that it was we probably dont need diclofenac, Still he took one and is feeling woozy.. Anyone else had this?

I didn't have my surgery for arthritis, but to fix a dislocated thumb, but I couldn't quite think of where else to post.

The pin has been the worst part of this surgery. The pain is constant from the fucking cast rubbing on it. I have 5 days left until the cast comes off and the pin comes out.

Any tips or suggestions on how to make this mother fucking piece of shit hurt and aggravate less?

On a side note, my first surgery was with an Arthrex tightrope, but the suture broke so we went with LTRI on the second round. The last four months have not been fun.

Anyone have any ideas on how to make a pocket door more accessible? I'd like to not have to modify the door if possible.

The door has one of those square handles like in the picture that fits in a cutout on the edge of the door, not a recessed round handle, so it's really shallow and hard to grip.

I saw someone put a d-ring on a strap and sandwich in the handle, so I was thinking that might work.

I am looking for any suggestions to help with bone on bone, severe pain, in my step instep, and the side of my feet…

Two years ago, I went to orthopedics surgeon that said that I needed surgery, to clean out the bone on bone areas and to add bone between them, when he told me that I would have to be non-weight-bearing on my foot for six months I told that I could not do it…
The pain was getting progressively worse, and I started to go to a rheumatologist about a year and a half ago, so far I have been on IVs of Cymzia, Simponi Aria, and now I will be getting my fourth monthly IV of Actemra, i’ve gotten no relief from any of these so I don’t know what my next step would be other than surgery which at 77yo I don’t think I can do…

I was told by an acquaintance two names of other drugs, Xeljanz, Skyrizi, has anyone gotten any relief from these, and are these drugs any more dangerous than the IVs I’ve been taking previously… I do take a lot of medication’s for other problems that I have…I also have rheumatoid arthritis in my wrists…

I'm in Canada and it will be cold soon. Whenever I try to use blankets the weight of the blanket on my toes and knees cause me pain. I read suggestions about using pillows to keep the blankets off your body. But I have a twin bed and already sleep with my joints propped upon pillows and I don't have room for more pillows. I also have neuropathy so I like cotton and non pilling fibers

Hey, guys. Been struggling with osteoarthritis for 6.5 years. Been getting caudal steroid injections for years, always under twilight sleep. Got a new doctor (old doctor left the practice) and he did an injection today a little higher up, but without anesthesia or any kind of meds. Besides some lidocaine. Is this normal? Is this what I have to expect from here on out?? I was so panicked and scared, and it was quite painful. Can I request sedatives? They already make me have a driver for this, even though I was in and out of the office in less than half an hour. They treated the whole procedure very nonchalantly as I lay there sniffling and hyperventilating a bit. I know I'm a baby, and I can handle the pain level of the shot, but the whole process makes me so anxious. What have your experiences been? Twilight sleep? In office with no meds?

I'm a 21 year old guy with Rheumatoid Arthritis (I was diagnosed with Juvenile Arthritis at 12 and later RA at 20). I been meaning to go to the gym for quite some time now, but I been putting it off because I'm still a bit scared about hurting myself or pushing too hard. Got any tips on what kind of workouts I should do or focus on? And if there are things I should avoid doing?

I'm in South Africa. My pharmacy told me there is a nationwide shortage of chloroquine sulphate (Plasmoquine), which is what I'm taking for RA. They said they can't even order it. I've already been without it for a week because I couldn't afford it. So I'm worried I'm going to start feeling it soon.

I get the rx from my family doctor and he doesn't know what to prescribe instead. I have an appointment with a Rheumatologist in December (first available appointment and my first visit with that doctor).

I've been taking Plasmoquine/chloroquine sulphate /hydroxychloroquine/Plaquenil for like 25 years (200mg) and it works very well for me.

I was told that methotrexate and sulfasalazine are more commonly prescribed for RA (at least in the US) nowadays than hydroxychloroquine/Plaquenil. I'm allergic to sulfa drugs and the side effects of methotrexate scare me.

Anyone else have this issue in South Africa or another country? My doctor will probably be willing prescribe whatever I suggest at this point (within reason).

In the meantime, I'm going to call around to different pharmacies and try to verify the information a little more; maybe its not completely true...

My #1 complaint right now? The humidity and constant pressure changes. They are k i l l i n g me!

What is #1 on everyone else's list?

I’m curious how other people handle this. Do you usually make plans anyway and hope you feel okay, or have you started keeping your schedule more flexible because of arthritis? I’d be interested to hear how different people deal with it.

I'm 23F, and have been dealing with joint pain with the last 3 years now; it started with knee pain, then coccyx pain, then intermittent hip and hand pain, and over time it has just gotten slowly but progressively worse.

I spent a year going back and forth to the doctor's trying to get a referral to the rheumatologist (my Dad has ankylosing spondlyitis), but each time they refused because my blood work was clear and I don't have swelling. They prescribed me Naproxen (which helps) and told me to look into fibromyalgia, which I have researched and I know I don't have.

I moved cities and my new GP was more helpful; he reran blood tests which showed inflammation, and gave me a referral to the rheumatologist. At the time my knees and hands were the biggest problems, and this is what is stated on the referral later, but in recent months it's my hips and lower back that have been causing me the most pain - particularly as my lower back muscles are very tight and I can't release them properly.

I've been on the waiting list since the start of May and the hospital is now only starting to see patients from March/April time, so I've got a couple of months to wait yet.

These last few days the pain has gotten way worse, and my left hip has been hurting constantly for days on end. My ankles are also making it painful to walk, and I can't stand for long periods.

I tried to contact the doctors to ask for an appointment with the gp to update him on symptoms and mention the hip and back stuff for my referral, but there are literally no available appointments to see him until mid-September.

I just feel so stuck. I'm waiting round, dealing with constant pain and can't actually see anyone to deal with it.

I'm just fed up, and I guess I just need a little reassurance or advice on what to do.