Hi, I’m 51, also recently diagnosed. Like you I experienced symptoms that I put down to a physical job, previous injuries etc. My symptoms all started a year ago with back pain and stiffness that moved around the sacrum and lower back causing extreme stiffness. I had physio/osteo and massage and it helped, but then my back was always sensitive to jarring and I was finding it hard to run my dog at agility competition. Then in June this year my back flared up big time, with abdominal spasms, the pain moved from the middle of my back, to the lumbar and then the sacrum where I just got worse and worse. I also had rib pain that I did not correlate. I struggled to get up out of bed I was in so much pain. I had private scans of my thorax and lumbar and saw a private rheamatologist, and thank God I did as she asked for a further scan of my SI joints which revealed a question about sinister pathology. I was then fast tracked and finally diagnosed in August with Multiple Myeloma. It’s a shame because the doctors only to teleconsults they were not seeing my worsening progression and kept prescribing pain killers. I was really scared that my symptoms would not improve as my mobility got really effected I had to resort to using walking poles to get around. After 6 treatments, there has been a dramatic decline in the paraproteins and finally mu mobility has started to improve and I am starting to move around better. My rib pain is still there, but much improved. Reading other’s stories, I am hoping that in time I will be more back to normal again. There was a time I could only see a dark tunnel ahead, but now I am seeing the light and believe I will improve more. Like you I am keen to touch base with fellow myeloma people and read and hear about their journeys. I know everyone is different.
