I was diagnosed with vitiligo, which is an autoimmune skin pigmentation disorder, before I became ill with CFS.
Before I became ill with CFS, I had a bone graft to repair damage from a benign cyst in my ankle (the talus.) I used donor bone, which was heat sterilized -- but I have heard somewhere that XMRV isn't vulnerable to the heat treatments they use. One year later, I became ill with extremely swollen glands, fever, and severe myalgia, within 5-6 days of receiving a flu shot. I was initially diagnosed with "Cat Scratch Fever," because my glands were so swollen, but nobody ever actually did the PCR to look for Bartonella. A few weeks later I had an attack of shingles. A few months after that, I was diagnosed with Fibromyalgia. But I "recovered," and for another 18 months believed I was well. Then, I received an MMR vaccine (measles, mumps, rubella.) Within one week of receiving the vaccine, I became ill with a sore throat, and the joint in my left elbow became severely swollen and painful. I also had swelling and pain in my neck, wrists, and finger, and had severe episodes of post-exertional malaise I was diagnosed with reactive arthritis, which eventually traveled and inflamed every joint in my body, except my jaw. I had severe problems and pain with the reactive arthritis for four years, but in the last two I have hardly had any symptoms of that nature, and very little pain unless I am over-exerting myself. I do have severe post-exertional malaise, and have had ever since the MMR shot. I started having frequent, severe migraines 2 years ago for the first time in my life, so now I have that instead of the joint pain. I met Canadian Consensus Criteria for diagnosis with CFS by Dr. Batemen earlier this year.
Anyway, I'm not sure if my reactive arthritis counts as auto-immune in some sense -- I was sure I had RA or Lupus or something of that nature for years. But possibly it just took me four years to clear the Rubella virus from my joint tissues.
