Another flare, another existential crisis…

OK, I'm exaggerating. The flare is real, the existential crisis not so much, but I am wondering whether to continue this blog, as all I do these days is post occasionally to say, 'Hi guys I'm flaring' and then not post for months because I have nothing to say about RA, thanks to being pretty …

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RA Awareness Week

Next week is RA Awareness Week in the UK and the busy bees at the National Rheumatoid Arthritis Society have created a series of wellbeing sessions under the banner #ourmindsRApriority - I do like RApriority ... 🙂 You can sign up for free sessions here. I'm feeling pretty lucky at the moment - I'm OK …

Flare finally over – woohoo!

Since I started the steroids a couple of weeks ago, I've been ticking of little milestones: today I can bend the leg a bit, today I managed to walk round the garden ... and bigger ones, today I stopped using my stick, today I made it onto my favorite local footpath ... but today's milestone …

Here comes the cavalry

Well, if you read this blog much you’ll have an idea I’ve been flaring, semi-flaring, recovering from flares and going into new flares, for a wee while now. (Or not - 'cause I realise I've failed to actually post about most of it!) I was quite shocked to find, when I did a little history, …

This is what I have to put up with

There's just one problem with the top notice on the side door of my GP surgery, below: Did you guess? No, I wasn't picking up on anything grammatical - although  I could... This door IS the different entrance you'll be using. I think they meant to stick the notice on the main door instead. <Insert …

Shielding letter: Part 2

This is that rare thing, Pollyanna Penguin trying to stay calm, measured and reasonable, and not 'fly off the handle' at the GP, since I don't particularly want to get thrown off the practice register. (Although if the practice up the road with the much better reputation would take me, that would be a blessing …

Shielding letter

Here in the UK there are two categories of 'vulnerability' to COVID-19, 'vulnerable' and 'shielding'. I've known I was in the vulnerable category from day 1 - in fact before day 1 of the lockdown. From a week or so before lockdown I was already practicing 'social distancing' and not going into shops etc. because …

A quick update during lockdown

Well, we're still locked down and I'm just getting used to the various terminologies - I find that I am not 'self-isolating' because that's what people who have symptoms of COVID-19 have to do, but I am vulnerable, although I'm not shielding. 'Confused? You won't be, after the next episode of SOAP!' (Anyone else remember …

Survey about COVID-19 and Plaquenel

I've been contacted by a scientist at the University of Ferrara who is looking into whether Plaquenil, also known as Aralan, chloroquine or hydroxychlroquine, can help with COVID-19/coronovirus. Please re-post, write your own version or whatever, if you blog, to get as many people filling this is as we can! Please take the survey here, even …

There’s a thin line …

There’s a thin line between bravery and stupidity and those of us who are saying they’re just going to ignore advice to self-isolate or socially distance and get on with their lives may be surprised to know that they’ve crossed it to the wrong side! COVID-19 is a pretty low risk disease to the vast …