Martha's story

Martha was a very active happy-go-lucky girl who loved running around with her friends, playing football, going swimming and riding her bike. Earlier this year we noticed that she was becoming tired for no apparent reason, complaining that her legs hurt and was unable to do simple things like get herself dressed and walk down the stairs. Things were getting worse quite rapidly. We noticed her struggle a great deal with normal day-to-day activities and keeping up with her friends.

After several visits to the GP, Martha was referred for a scan as she had a swollen wrist. By the time the appointment came through, her other wrist was swollen too. Following the scan, she was referred to rheumatology urgently and two weeks later, Martha was diagnosed with polyarticular Juvenile Idiopathic Arthritis (JIA).

JIA is something that we had never heard of and our summer was taken up with hospital appointments and the start of Martha’s treatment. This wasn’t an easy time for Martha as her condition continued to fluctuate. She’s now on methotrexate and we are hoping to see an improvement.

At one of our early hospital visits, we were told about Juvenile Arthritis Research – a small charity making a big difference to the lives of children like Martha. We were sent a “Little Box of Hope” pack from Juvenile Arthritis Research to help Martha understand what was happening and it was absolutely perfect.

Initially Martha was very reluctant to tell people about her JIA. She was worried she would get bullied for it and wanted to keep it to herself. However, she wanted to turn her diagnosis into something positive, so as a family we have signed up to complete a local Santa 5K race just before Christmas to raise much-needed funds for Juvenile Arthritis Research. As the donations have been coming in and Martha has read the kind messages from family and friends, she was boosted with every single one and is now happy to tell others about her JIA.

This has not been an easy thing for Martha to understand or cope with. She has struggled immensely with the pain and limitations caused by her JIA and finds the treatment and regular blood tests very hard. As a parent it is heartbreaking for us to see. She even tells us that her Christmas wish is for her JIA to go away. We have been lucky to get a diagnosis as quickly as we did but there is a lot we are still trying to get used to. If it wasn’t for Juvenile Arthritis Research, and the information and resources they have provided us with, we would have been facing this diagnosis alone.”

Beth  Martha’s mum