thanks hippiemom

 Your words were encouraging. I appreciate your response. I'm feeling better mentally today but not physically. There has to be something that causes Lupus and I'm not going to stop til I find the source and a cure. Sounds idealist, I know, but I believe .. . I will keep you posted

Hi editor--
I do know that there is exciting research going on in cytokine and anti-cytokine therapies. I had AI disease and was mistakenly given alpha nterferon, a powerful immune boosting cytokine. There is alpha, beta and gamma interferons. If a person is given too much alpha interferon, they will develop systemic lupus and develop anti-ds-dna, this is pretty well documented. There is also something called anti-interferon alpha, which is an antibody to interferon, it can cause other different problems, but I think that these cytokine therapies are where its at and will be the key to effective treatment and control of lupus. Here's a link to an interesting article that seems off topic, (about the side effects of cytokine and anticytokine therapies) but in reading it you will realize what happens when people have high amounts of these naturally occuring substances in their bodies. It used to be at:

http://www.rheuma21st.com/archives/cutting_edge_cyto_therapy_shoenfeld.html

But I cant get there