Well I got my scope tests done friday afternoon. All I was told was I did have GERD which I already knew and that my colon looked good. So it must be "IBS" I guess idk. So...my theory is that all my symptoms can be explained by lupus effecting each of the 3 parts of my nervous system(Central, Peripheral & Autonomic).
Then, by sunday morning I awoke from a dead sleep with pain upon breathing. I thought maybe it was the way I had slept so I tried a hot shower, heating pad and ice but all it did was relax the tension in the muscle next to my spine and made me realize the pain was coming from my ribs instead. It was so bad I had to breathe shallow & couldn't move,talk much and had to lay elevated & curled up in a ball on the opposite side so it didn't hurt as much. After the heat & ice took care of the muscle tension it was a little better & tolerable enough to move some...so, although I had been having symptoms of a flare the few days prior I didn't have any symptoms in regards to any infection etc. So, I dealt with it and waited a day. Yesterday I woke up and the pain was still there and the more I moved around the worse it would get. I also noticed I started to feel a burning sensation in the spot that hurt. I called to try and get an appt with my rheumy but I couldn't get in till Jan. 25th at the earliest locally. So I decided to go to the ER just to be safe. Good thing too, I have pneumonia and pleurisy.(first time). They put me on Zithromax & Naprosyn. Has anyone else had this? They checked for blood clots at first because I had no sign of infection. No fever, no cough, etc etc. Only things remotely close was lose of appetite(couldve been due to the flare) & my right tonsil was swollen & felt like a hard lump when I swallow but that could've been explained away by postnasal drip due to chronic allergies and the runny nose I had. I guess it would then be considered "walking pneumonia?" I sat and thought about it and if I hadn't gone it would've gotten worse and who knows what then.
I wrote my rheumy an email and explained everything I have mentioned in this post.
Due to the lack of signs of infection, could the pneumonia & pleurisy be due to the lupus itself?
Thanks. Hope you all are well. *hugs* -Lupie Britt