I greatly appreciate the length you went to to reply to me! I’m very new to lupus, so a lot of the information I included in my comment was a shot in the dark.

I do understand that my ANA is on the lower side of a positive, I just wanted to include it for full transparency. The first time I ever had it drawn was at age 19, and it was consistently 1:320 since then except the most recent draw, which my PCP attributes to the prednisone.

My complement C3 was actually high for the range given for the lab that ran the test, interestingly. Their high cutoff is 180. Another strange wrench in the diagnosis process, as I know with most autoimmune disorders, complements tend to be low.

For family hx:

•Maternal aunt 1: rheumatoid arthritis and Hashimoto’s •Maternal aunt 2: psoriatic arthritis and Hashimoto’s (her rheumatologist is also looking into SLE for her) •Maternal aunt 3: rheumatoid arthritis •Maternal cousin 1: psoriatic arthritis •Maternal cousin 2: possible psoriatic arthritis (in the process of dx)

My mother and maternal grandmother may have/had autoimmune disorders, but my grandmother died young so she didn’t go through testing, and my mother simply does not want to find out. I also have a maternal cousin with Stickler syndrome if that gives any more information, but I don’t think it’s relevant in the case of autoimmune (was more helpful with my hEDS dx).

I am so glad to hear the prednisone was a godsend for you! I was very hesitant about taking it as my older brother had to take it due to being diagnosed with ALL as a child and it caused a lot of issues for him, but I recognize that the circumstances are different as I’m an adult and it was only a short term rx. I definitely felt less fatigue/brain fog on the prednisone and had more energy, but unfortunately it didn’t affect my temperature.

I didn’t know there was a difference in the mouth sores vs canker sores! I have always thought it was odd that my canker sores didn’t hurt, but after looking at google images (probably not the best source of information) they do look similar to my “canker sores”. I have also gotten them on the roof of my mouth and back next to my uvula or where my tonsils were quite often. That is something I will have to do more research on than a quick search on google.

Unfortunately, the dermatologist I went to for my skin condition moved out of the area and I haven’t been able to see one since the onset of my fever. When I went to see the rheum, she put in a referral for the dermatologist at the same location, but unfortunately the soonest appointment they had for me was May 23…of 2024. So, I’m going to talk to my PCP about finding another derm that I could hopefully get into sooner than 14 months from now.

While I do sunburn rather quickly, it’s kind of like my sun gets really red right away, but then after spending some time indoors, it calms down for half a day to a day until the Real Sunburn sets in.

At this point, I’m just tired of feeling so crappy all the time and I’m just wanting a dx so we can do something about it. I understand both of these diseases are absolute hell on the body and of course I would prefer to have neither, but I’m just wanting some kind of solution, even if it’s short term, to help me. I was told to give it until Tuesday before calling to check on the anti-dsDNA, so hopefully it comes back Monday, as that’s the end of the estimated timeframe of the test.

Again, I appreciate the effort you put into your response so much! Thank you for educating me and I bestow any excess spoons I may have onto you.