Your body feels really weird and you can’t figure out why. Your joints ache a lot even when you don’t exercise, your feet swell, and you toes get cold and blue, but your friends say it’s because you turn your air conditioner on too high. They also blame your loss of hair on all the chlorine in the school pool. But you know all the things that are happening to you just aren’t right. You don’t tell your parents or go see a doctor; instead you suffer in silence!

The greatest danger of suffering in silence is that you give yourself no chance to correct what’s wrong with you. The symptoms you have maybe the warning signs of a serious but curable disease called Lupus. Lupus is a long lasting, autoimmune disease. What happens to those who suffer from it, is that certain organs and cells in their bodies which are supposed to protect them against harmful bacteria and viruses etc. don’t do their job. Instead of attacking dangerous infections, their cells mistakenly attack other healthy cells and tissues. These attacks weaken the immune system so much that it’s no longer able to give the protection the body needs.

More than 1.4 million people in the US suffer from lupus; more than 14,000 are teenagers. By paying close attention to your body and to the warning signs of lupus, you can learn enough to get help in recognizing it, treating it, and even preventing the disease.