Struggling with adapting to this new me

Woozle

My mental health is really suffering. Could be side effects, or the condition RA, OA with Sjogrens

Ellen

Good Morning @Woozle a very warm welcome to the Versus Arthritis online Community.

I see from your post that you have RA, OA and Sjogren's too. That is a lot to be coping with and quite understandable for it all to be affecting your mental health. Many of our members here find coping with Arthritis can affect their mood.

In fact I did a search for you of recent threads on the subject and got these results:

https://community.versusarthritis.org/search?query=low%20mood&sort=-dateInserted&scope=site&source=community

The first one or two are medication specific but do read on something might strike a chord with you. Some of the contributors are still regular posters.

The effect of long term conditions on our mental health is very well known and this information might be of interest to you too:

https://www.versusarthritis.org/news/2021/september/arthritis-and-depression-what-you-can-do-about-it/

Finally you might want to ring our helpline if you think it might help to talk things through:

https://www.versusarthritis.org/get-help/helpline/

My very best wishes

Ellen.

frogmorton

Morning @Woozle (love your username by the way!)

are any of your conditions a new diagnosis I wonder? If so how long have you been on your meds? It can take a while for Arthritis meds for inflammatory Arthritises like RA to actually help.

If it is a new diagnosis (your title says struggling to adapt to this new me so I think maybe it is) have you read any of this stuff? I read it a while ago when I posted it for another new person and it hit home for me too even though I have had Arthritis for many many years now.

https://www.versusarthritis.org/about-arthritis/newly-diagnosed/

When I was first diagnosed I thought my life was over. I spiralled right down this forum helped lift me back up. Being with kind people who were just like me made me feel so much better.

Please do ask us anything if we can help we will.

This might be worth a read:

https://www.versusarthritis.org/news/2022/december/how-aids-and-adaptations-can-help-if-you-have-arthritis/

You can ask to be referred to a physio or Occupational therapist they should be able to help make your life much easier.

Take very good care and keep talking here and maybe do ring the helplines. I did - twice - and bawled my head off, but it helped.

Take care

Toni xx

wendy19

Hi

Me too, recently diagnosed and feeling a little overwhelmed. I am trying to take it as day at a time and think in the moment but can't help worrying about the future

Ellen

Hi @wendy19

A very quick welcome from me I hope you will find some of the information I and frogmorton have left for @Woozle useful yourself.

It's lovely when someone's first post is them reaching out to someone like this.

Now that you've made your first post, please do have a look round the rest of the online Community. Living with Arthritis tends to be one of our most popular categories.

Best wishes

Ellen.

jonr

Hello Woozle and Wendy19,

It is no wonder your mental health is suffering and I think it's ocmpletely natural, after all you've both been given life-changing diagnosis so that needs to sink in and then I found in my own case that feelings of sadness and worrying about the future began to hit me.

First and foremost - you are not on your own and joining this community is a great first step, apart from anything else, unless the health professionals you are talking too suffer with Arthritis in any of its forms, they won't be walking in your shoes - we all are here.

Knowledge is power, so my advice is to get stuck into the content on the website, there's some really good info about pain management which will help you to maintain and improve your quality of life and make doing exercise and physio so much easier. Doctors can only do so much by prescribing medication but there are a lot of other things to look at from naturally-sourced preparations, gels and ointments to electric-shoc therapy (TENS) and Acupuncture. It's trial and error as there is no guarantee that any of these will work as we and our conditions are all different.

I lot of advice for a long-term outlook will focus on exercise and therapy to strengthen joints and connecting tissues, etc but there's 2 other upsides to this. For example, simply walking in the fresh air can be a mood-lifter and if you are able to do any non-impact exercise such as swimming, cycling, rowing, cross-trainers, etc the cardio will produce Endorphins which are not only the body's natural feel-good hormones but natural painkillers too, plus of course you'll be getting fit and healthy. I find that doing these helps me to take the focus off my Arthritis and after I finish I feel a real sense of accomplishment and positive so a real mental health boost.

Hope this is of some help, please do check in as often as you want for a boost.

Take care,

Jon

Woozle

Thank you John,