My rheumatologist kept saying my labs were ‘fine’ while i was having three-week flares every month. didn’t matter that i could barely move my hands or that i was sleeping 10 hours and still exhausted. i started logging everything: which days the joints swelled, what my CRP was on those days, when my face would get photosensitive. brought two months of notes to my next appointment. she actually looked at the pattern instead of just the test results. asked about my prednisone taper for the first time. ngl finally moved me to a different biologic. now i don’t show up empty-handed. does anyone else find their doctor takes them more seriously when you have the timeline written down?
“Fine” labs are usually just a sampling error.