Rheumatoid Arthritis Support Group

Rheumatoid arthritis is a chronic, inflammatory, multisystem, autoimmune disorder. It is a disabling and painful condition which can lead to substantial loss of mobility due to pain and joint destruction. The disease is also systemic in that it often also affects many extra-articular tissues throughout the body including the skin, blood vessels, heart, lungs, and...

2,179 Members

16,355 Posts

0 Online

achymom 08/11/2013

All - I'm quite worried and am looking for opinions / reassurance. My 8 year old son has been pulling at his fingers for the past few weeks. He's been pulling/stretching them back (up) from his palms, saying something feels weird and that he needs to do it to make them feel better. So much that he's doing it all day long, and has actually now got a rash on the tops of his knuckles from bending them the wrong way. I wasn't that concerned at first, could be from sports / bike riding; and now could also be partially a habit. But it continues, and he told me he's annoyed by it, so I called his doc.

We saw our pediatrican a couple of days ago and she's not sure what it is. We are using coritisone cream on the rash (clearing up very fast), but given my RA diagnosis she doesn't want to dismiss it without digging into it a bit. So now waiting for a referral to a pediatric rheumy. SERIOUSLY??? He's only 8. I am the only person in family to every have anything autoimmune, and it hit me when I was 37. I'm lucky that my condition is in remission, but that feels like a non-event if my son is going to have to deal with this.

I'm almost afraid to ask- have any of you with kids seen this?

worried achy.

trishcorsi 08/11/2013

My daughter, now 31, has had battles with autoimmune things since she was 8 or 9. Weird rashes on her legs that the docs couldn't figure out; I had one pediatrician tell me he suspected lupus, but nothing came of that. When she was a freshman she had a horrible bout of mononucleosis, and still suffer from weird thing. I mad sure that last time she went to doc to have her checked with a blood test to make sure her ra factors were normal. I can only say, from having been there and done this, have him checked and if all is okay just work on the habit control. Trish

achymom 08/11/2013

thanks to both of you. I have a long list of blood tests that I will take him for when I find out when our appt is at the children's hospital. The full list (plus some) that we've all gone through. Yuck. I really hope this goes away on it's own, quickly. He's really too young for this.

bcatz 08/11/2013

My daughter pops her knuckles and her toes. She often has things get out of whack from gymnastics and basketball. They always get better, but I do have my radar up.
I don't want any tests though - not yet, not til some symptom really sticks. Quite a few people in my family have autoimmune (aunt with RA, cousin with MS, me with RA, cousin with Crohns).
I know your fear - hang in there.

camba 08/12/2013

My son did that a lot too from quite a young age. I dont necessarily think it means anything but it may. My son is now in late 20s and living overseas. He is a little concerned as he is having trouble with his knees but otherwise hasnt had auto immune symptoms (eg swelling, redness)

None of my children are healthy. One has a worse auto immune disease than this and the youngest has various health issues though not auto immune.

The only way you can really find out is to check in with medico and get lots of tests done. Even if it is RA it might not manifest ever into the full thing and even if it does could take years. I certainly had "stuff" in retrospect from pre school but didnt hit me thump til my late fifties.

Christine26 08/12/2013

Hi achymom, so sorry about your youngster. Hope it isn't RA. We hate to see our children suffer from a diagnosis that we have that we know is not good. My two sons do not have any auto immune signs and symptoms and hope they don't show up with any later on in life. My mom was diagnosed after I was with RA and hers is very mild. Hoping your son is well and everything turns out okay for him.

deleted_user 08/12/2013

My son was actually the first one in our household to be diagnosed with an autoimmune disease - type 1 diabetes. He was 8. Later on he was also diagnosed with Celiac Disease. He's been on an insulin pump and a gluten free diet for about 10 years now. I worry that RA may strike him one day as well. : (

deleted_user 08/12/2013

oh boy ..that 's all something to worry about ..i dont have children but nephews i love like my own ..the middle one did that for a while ..he has a.d.d and afew other things ..but not autoimmune ad he would do the same tings to his hands ..then he started to grow out of it .not sure if this helps at all but just another way of looking at this...autoimmune diseases run in our family but he was tested and it came back negative ..

deleted_user 08/12/2013

i know how you feel. but i hope everything turns out normal. i have a 3yr old daughter. but still worry about her getting RA from me. its only lucky me who has this RA in my entire family.

pls get him tested and make sure everything is normal. hope it might not be RA. lots of prayers and hugs.

good luck.

achymom 08/13/2013

thanks for all your thoughts and good wishes. I'm waiting to hear about the timing of a referral before I take him for the bloodwork. We leave on a big family vacation this week, and I don't want to be worrying about getting lab results back while we are away. Who knows, maybe playing on the beach for a while will make it all go away :-)

When I was diagnosed I took all 3 of my sons to my naturopath to have them tested for food sensitivites, as I was tested and was very sensitive to gluten / dairy etc. My oldest and youngest came back moderately sensitive to the usual food suspects, but my little knuckle cracker came back sensitive to nothing at all -- so I thought he was in the clear.

Like my mom told me when I was pregnant and anxious for the safe arrival of my first - when he or she gets here, you'll never ever stop worrying. No kidding.

achy.

bluedogs2 08/13/2013

We are parents forever. That allows us to worry.

Peace
Bluedogs2

altoclef 08/13/2013

Hope it does turn out to be a whole lot of nothing. School will start soon, so if it is from some sort of overuse, maybe it will go away.

achymom 09/25/2013

Thought I'd post an update - finally got my little guy into the paediatric rheumy and she doesn't think it's arthritis at all. Phew. So very relieved. I can handle this for myself but do not want to pass this to any of our children. Thanks for all the positive thoughts.

Achy.

trishcorsi 09/25/2013

So glad to hear the good news about your so n. Yeah! Trish

Angelpuss 09/26/2013

That is great news and you must feel so relieved. Our youngest daughter, 33 years old, used to do that, too, as a child but grew out of it and hasn't had any autoimmune problems.
As I'm the first in my family to have RA, the thought that I could pass it on to our three daughters scares me. However when I asked my Rheumy about this, he said their chance of getting RA was only slightly more than people with no family history.

Join the Conversation