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You may have just been told by your doctor that you have RA may have had it for years.
One of the first things to do is listen to your doctor AND NOT to neighbours, friends, or even family. Having RA is a bit like having a baby everyone seems to be an expert on the subject!
I should know I have had RA now for 19 years, and during those 19 years have been given innumerable pieces of information and home remedies that I was assured would work, only they didn't.

Another problem is, many non-sufferers, (and some who do have it), think that RA is about painful joints. If only it were that simple. Rheumatoid Arthritis is a multi-system disease amongst a group called autoimmune diseases. What it means is basically we attack our own joints, especially the small ones.
Not only do we slowly erode those joints, side affects can be loss of weight, depression, anaemia, and involvement of other organs apart from the joints, to name but a few.
Modern drugs available for treating RA are numerous, and all involve a swings and roundabout' situation. Take, for example, prednisone, a synthetic form of drug we naturally produce in the adrenal glands the ones just above the kidneys. It is a wonder drug for sure, but has many side effects. Thinning of the skin layers, lowered resistance to infection, delayed wound healing, and occasionally cataracts, to name but a few. Prednisone is not the only drug used to have side effects, but the benefits, (for me anyway), outweigh the disadvantages for sure.
In addition you have disease modifying drugs that over time slow the rate of progress down considerably.
Every day life can become a struggle, and it is only those having the disease who realise how the manufacturing world seems against us!
Bubble packs! One of my pet hates. Struggling with those when you have RA is a Mount Everest of a challenge. I bought a new web cam last week, and it was better off inside the rigid plastic box than the gold in Fort Knox.
You use liquid coffee creamer? There's one where you have to remove the plastic top in order to remove the strip sealing the container. That, too is like taking part in some challenge of strength.
Jar lids with that cute protective pop-up button in the middle stare back at me daring me to try open them.
Can openers are slowly becoming a thing of the past with the advent of pull rings making our lives easier, or so you would think. You fellow sufferers know that pull ring can seem like the weight of the world as you struggle

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