My Rheumy told me that there will be stages with the illness - his newly diagnosed patients usually are very upbeat and positive about the illness and take it 'too well' - then they get to about 8 - 10 years and they realise its going to stay around, is incurable and in some may gradually get worse and they tend to get depressed. He says he sees this pattern often.
I came down with it and another autoimmune problem with i was 26 and having an awesome year up until that point. I denied it away for years before it got too bad to ignore and started impacting on life and work bigtime.
Contemplating TNF alpha meds or a NSD to try and stem the tide at least for a while.
