Hi Naomi

Sorry to hear about the numbness, the list of symptoms are just never ending with R.A don't you think?

It sounds like the numbness is connected to your knee. Do you have swelling behind the knee because this can pinch the nerves and cause numbness in the muscles? Perhaps have a word with your GP or specialist, do you keep getting flares? If so you may need your medication looked at.

take care Naomi and hope you get some relief soon.
Love
Rebecca

Thanks Sylvia. Sometimes I get so fed up and tired with all the appointments that I just can't bring myself to go to the GP. What with physio, OT, podiatry, consultants, blood monitoring, counselling and dermatology I am exhausted! I try to keep my appointments to no more than one a week if possible as they are very tiring when you don't have a car. Part of me also feels a bit defeatist and that they will not be able to do anything anyway or I will be brushed off and then feel rubbish. I know i would advise a friend to make an appointment if they had numbness so I'll get around to it when I can face it.

I'm wondering about your bruise. I know I had one on the thigh that took around 3 months to go away. I don't even know what caused it. I have quite low platelets so maybe that's the cause. I assume you've had your checked out as a year is a very long time to have a bruise.

Naomi, xx

Naomi

I know how you feel about going to the doctors, but the thing with RA is that it can affect so many things, since I was diagnosed with RA and been reading on lots of forums the things that it can cause, I have been shocked. I think we all tend to think it's mainly just about our joints and it's not, plus we also have to contend with side effects of our drugs as well.

Perhaps a call to your RA nurse might be the answer. He or she probably will have more knowledge of the illness and drugs than a GP would. It really is such a complex illness and our GP's are not trained up on RA like the specialist nurses are.

I've started to get bruising. A really big one appeared on my leg, painful to touch, yet I could not remember banging myself. I thought it might of been because I was taking steroids at the time, I know you can bruise easy when you are on them. This must of been around a month ago and you can still see it faintly. I now have a bruise on each arm, one that looks like a normal bruise and the other one is like the one on my leg, but not so big. I did bang my arm but I can't remember which one, I am not on steroids now so I can't put it down to them. I've been checking myself every morning since for any more bruises. I will tell my RA nurse when I see her on Thursday, I have read that you are suppose to report unexplained bruising when on Enbrel.

Take Care
Love Paula x

I saw the podiatrist and he thought it's likely that my wonky knee that keeps collapsing is causing it. I have knee exercises from the physio which I need to take more seriously. It's so hard keeping up with all the exercises from physio, OT and now podiatrist too. Sigh.....

hi Naomi,
Just to say I've not had numbness in my legs that I can remember, but I have a patch of numbnees just below my neck towards my right shoulder that always feels numb, initially I had alot of probs with my shoulders but that happens less frequently now. When my hands become bad with tendonitis type symtoms I always have numbness in bits and bobs of my hands and fingers. So I guess it is all part and parcel of the whole package
Its surprising how many odd things that appear that we just take on board and rub along side with!!!
Hope the exercises help. I've never really seen anyone to get advice on helpful exercises except when in hospital with flare-ups.
Will start a thread to ask others experiences in this area.
Hope your knee improves soon, I'm struggling with my right knee at the mo after having to come off abatercept whist waiting to see dermatologist.
You are so right it just seems to be one thing after another with this silly disease.....
Best wishes Zena xx