Iritis.org

I've intended for a while to get online and tell everyone my experience and discovery with my Iritis condition.

I started having the terrible experience at 18. I was first misdiagnosed with pink eye and my eye got so bad it was really nearly unbearable. They ended up getting it right and had to give me the ole steroid shots behind my eye. Beautiful right, just what everyone wants, a needle coming at you in 3D, lol.

Anyways, it would reoccur about every 4-5 years. I'm 46 now and have had it about 6-7 times. The last 2 times it lasted 5 weeks or so, really bad. Where as in the early days it was cured fairly fast once I knew what was going on by getting into the doctor and quickly. They eventually, somewhat, linked it to curvature in my spine, ankylosing spondylitis. Even though they seemed to have maybe determined why the iritis was occurring, they still couldn't prevent it.

I used to be able to actually know when it was coming by suddenly feeling a glitch kind of pressure in my eye. I'd be like "oh great, here comes iritis", and people would think I was full of it, but then a couple days later I'd be done, eye just throbbing. Well after the last 2 episodes the pressure never left. Although the pain and inflamation would subside, the pressure that normally indicated to me that it was coming, stayed.

A while back I was watching a show about juicing. Not thinking of iritis, but more general health, I decided to give it a go. I went and got me a Ninja Blender (because it shreds the pulp to a drinkable/tolerable state). I put many things in that blender; tomatoes, spinach, carrots, green apples, red chard, blue berries, black berries, celery, flax seeds, lemon, and apple cider vinegar. LOL, a lot of stuff right? Believe it or not it tastes pretty good. More than that, the pressure in my eye, which had remained for the last 3-4 years, was soon gone. This was something I was not expecting, nor even began juicing for. I just realized one day shortly after "hey, my eye feels better". "What did I change", I thought to myself. THE JUICING, HELLO!!

It's now been 8 years since my last iritis complication. Maybe my diet really sucked that bad? I don't know. I just wanted to throw my experience out there in hopes that it could help some of you.

Let me say I'm not advertising Ninja Blenders or anything like that. Nor am I recommending the exact fruits and vegetables that I use. I don't want any one having health issues because of my post because they mixed things their systems don't agree with. This juicing may not even have anything to do with my iritis being in hibernation for so long. It could be something else all together, I'm not sure.

Just my experience, I wish all you sufferers of this crappy condition well, good luck, God Bless.

glad your iritis is now in remission, healthy eating can help keep inflammation down. should this once again return, please consider a visit to an uveitis specialist. the older you get with a history of uveitis, the harder it can get to get it controlled. the recurrent episodes can lead to changes in the retina which can be permanent and vision robbing. a steroid sparing approach to treatment is indicated should it return as the steroids also can cause problems over time with glaucoma and cataract formation.

wish you the very best,
Mike

Thanks Mike, appreciate the response and info.

Iritis is brutal. I know the steroids can also thin my optical nerve and could actually snap one day as well, or so I'm told.

I really hope the juicing is the answer for me. It was interesting how the pressure that became constant subsided shortly after juicing. I juice every morning about 3 weeks out of every month.

I am ignorant as to why your symptoms have changed. I do not know of any mechanism of action that can be attributed to lowering your symptoms from drinking any 'juice'. just be happy that your eyes seem to now be quiet. if it comes back I recommend that you see a uveitis specialist, not just a run of the mill ophthalmologist as the regular ophthalmologist is not trained to use anything but steroids. recurrent uveitis can cause you vision loss and steroids are not the answer. waiting too long for the unknown to work could make you wish you had sought help sooner.

take care,
Mike

Hey, if juicing works, good for you. Good diet has to help keep inflammation down. Makes sense. I may ty it myself. That being said, there is no substitute for good care from uveitis specialist. Always follow docs recommendations. This stuff is nothing to mess with:(

I can give some additional details on diet and especially juicing. The american diet is pretty much crap and we buy cheap processed food because they are easy. What most don't understand is it slowly poisons your body over time. This can increase inflammation anywhere in the body. While it is always great to see people to bring up remission because of X, it won't work with everyone. The medications won't even work with everyone. My belief is don't make things harder on your body by eating bad food, but also realize there are uveitis specialist that know how to treat this disease properly.

I actually started flaring years back and had several juice fasts under my belt. I decided to experiment while I was currently flaring, it lasted about 3 days and got really sick along with the iritis. It wasn't pretty. What I learned is if you are going to eat properly don't wait until you flare it needs to be a lifestyle change. I currently juice about 4 times a week and have been doing this for around 4 years. I don't know how it has impacted iritis because I am also on remicade. It makes me feel better overall and I am putting superfoods into my body so I will continue juicing.

Read a study that indicated that people with type2 diabetes are more likely to have chronic
Inflammation of tendons. So get rid of granular sugar.

A quick update, I'm 51 now, still juicing, and the Iritis has remained dormant!