What might be the cause of sudden onset joint/muscle pain an

What might be the cause of sudden onset joint/muscle pain an 
Author: sjohn 
Posted: 12/09 11:47 PM 
 
Hi
I am 30 years old. I began to get terrible joint and muscle pain combined with severe fatigue about 2 months ago. They tested me for things like mono, rheumatoid arthritis, etc. The only test that came back positive was one that said I am severely anemic. I am going to start one of five iron sucrose IVs today. My hematologist tells me that joint pain isn't usually associated with anemia, though. I am grasping at straws, but think I might have Valley Fever, as I used to live in Arizona.  I recently had a baby in November, and then had a terrible time afterwards with severe hemorraghing. My joint pain is worst in the morning and when I sleep, and generally gets better as the day goes on. The fatigue, however, hits me in the evening. I am so frustrated. I am having a hard time playing with my baby when my husband is at work due to the joint pain. I am pretty tough (I did natural childbirth), but this is just crippling me and putting me in a terrible mental state. I am often confused, irritable and can't focus. Any thoughts are appreciated. Thanks!

 
Author: setmefree 
Posted: 12/10 07:11 AM 
 
Hi sjohn and welcome to the forum! I'm sorry you're not feeling well. I'm not a doctor but will give you some guesses about your symptoms. Your fatigue and concentration problems could certainly be related to your anemia. Since you had significant enough postpartum hemorrhage to require IV iron, you must be very depleted. You'll probably start to feel significantly better after you get your treatments.
As for the arthritis-like symptoms, since you've been tested for everything else, you might be looking at a side effect of Suboxone. There is a pretty long thread about this on the forum on the side effects category. Although most if not all doctors have dismissed these symptoms as being related to Sub, there are (in my opinion) too many people who have experienced them on Sub to completely disregard the possibility that they ARE Sub related. When I first read the thread about these issues I didn't think much about it. But not long after that I started having some of the same things they were complaining about - real stiff in the mornings, waking in the night with my hands stiff and sore, weird stuff....
Some of the other posters wrote about how the symptoms abated after they decreased their Sub dose. Sure enough...I decreased my dose and the symptoms have all but disappeared.
How much Sub are you on? How long have you been on it? Have you discussed your symptoms with your Sub doctor?
We may never know for sure if this is Suboxone related and there is nothing about Sub that makes sense that it would cause this, but it just seems to me to be a pretty big coincidence. Once you've ruled out other possible diagnoses with your doctor, why not look into the Suboxone theory, right? If you're in a good place with your recovery, stable on your Suboxone you might ask your doctor if it would be okay to drop your dose, especially if you're on the higher doses (over 8mg or so a day).
Let us know what you find out and congratulations on the new baby!

 
Author: LatheDude 
Posted: 12/10 12:22 PM 
 
Hi sjohn --

this is probably a dumb question, but did they do a 'anti-nuclear antibody' test? They commonly refer to them as an ANA.

If you have ANA positive (or ANA+) all that tells you is that your immune system is involved inappropriately - somewhere your own immune system is attacking your own body. Such people that have Lupus, Rheumatoid arthritis, Type I diabetes, etc. would all have ANA+.

That was the first test we had done after years of strange pain for my wife that gave us some answers. She is ANA+ thus she has some type of autoimmune disease. It's like Lupus, but not perfectly. It's often like fibromyalgia, but not exactly.

So, if as setmefree asks - if it's not from too high a dose of sub, maybe you can check that out. If you have already, then thanks for reading Cool

If your autoimmune system is involved ANA+, often there are thing that rheumatologists can do to help.

Look forward to your posting an update!... From suboxforum.com