Hello,

My name is Tammy Boesen.  I have had been diagnosed with Lupus over 15 years.  It took almost 8 years for the doctors to finally have a diagnosis.  During the process of the doctors try to find out what is going wrong with your health, life is Very Misrable.  You put through the ringer of all kinds of medications and treatments.  You feel like a doctors' ginnypig during the whole time.  Your mind keeps thinking that you will never feel better again.

Once the doctors figure out what you have, you than go through even more specific testings, treatments and medications.  Just because the doctors figured out the diagnoses, doesn't mean that they can fix it or treat it properly. Because, there is NO Cure!  They only tell you that once they get the correct medications and treatments, they can Only try to keep you "stable/comfortable/to-a-point".

I was a workaholic. And, after my onset symptoms, I had to stop working because I could not guarentee if I would be able to even get out of bed.  I loved working and keeping busy.

FACTS:

Lupus is one of the cruelest, most mysterious deseases on earth -- an unpredictable and misunderstood autoimmune desease that ravages different parts of the body.  It is difficult to diagnose, hard to live with and a challenge to treat.

• Every 32 minutes, someone is diagnosed with Lupus.
• It takes an average of six years to be diagnosed with Lupus from the onset of symptoms.
• There are nearly 30,000 people in Wisconsin living with Lupus.
• An estimated of 1.5-2 million Americans have Lupus and 90% of people with Lupus are women; however, children and men also develop the disease.
• Research shows that nearly two-thirds of all Americans know little or Nothing about Lupus beyond the name.
• Despite the widespread prevalence of Lupus, research has remained underfunded, relative to its scope and devestating.