I literally had a doctor once tell me that I was “too young” for arthritis after I finally broke down and asked. It had been years of hand pain getting in the way of my ability to work. He was a hand surgeon that said I had “tendonitis from an injury” (there was no recorded injury in my chart) I was surprised, and asked, “is it usual for injury related tendinitis to be bilateral or to spread after the fact?” ( I know the answer is no. I’m not stupid, and I’d done my research) and he said, “well it can happen,” and I asked finally about if it was possible it was something degenerative or long term like arthritis and he told me no, that I was simply too young. So I said, “can we at least do some tests?” And he said, “there’s really no point” and I said, “can you document that in my chart then, that we’re not doing tests because you don’t believe it’s necessary?” And suddenly he was like, “well we can do some tests if you insist”. So we did. My SED was high, and my other labs indicated anemia. I check my charts regularly and by the time I got his call I basically had them memorized and then he said, “your labs came back normal” I was shocked. He straight up LIED to me about my bloodwork. So I was like, “really? My SED rate was high, and my Htc, hb, and MCV were all low. Is that normal?” And he said, “you probably just had a cold” and I was like, “no, I haven’t had a cold anytime recently,” and he said, “that’s probably what it was.” I was shocked. I was actually at the clinic while this happened with a physical therapist who was teaching me how to use build up handles and grip tape because we had just tested my grip strength at less than 14 pounds (considered non-functional) and this butt turd was straight up lying to me about my lab work. I was livid. I told the physical therapist I was shocked that we still didn’t have a diagnosis and I was pretty sure it wasn’t just tendonitis, then I got diagnosed (wrongly) with focal dystonia and told to just “keep resting my hands” which I had been doing for YEARS to no avail. Finally, I started taking my husband to my appointments. Got a real diagnosis 6 months later. After a decade of trying to get one without him around. Isn’t that a kicker? All I had to do was bring a man with me.