Many others become so disabled by arthritis they're homebound. She acknowledges that there are many others with the disease who are in worse shape than she is.Įven if her feet, hips, knees and hands are aching, she still manages to get through her scenes and continue her career in acting. However, Turturro is hesitant to complain too much about her pain. "I'm just beginning to learn about it and help myself." "Now I'm getting older, I'm a little more tired and hurting a little bit more," she says. It's constant."įor Turturro, like many people with rheumatoid arthritis, mornings are often the worst part of the day. It got harder to pretend nothing was wrong. As she aged, the pain and the fatigue worsened. It wasn't until her 30s that she got serious about seeking treatments - and figuring out how to help herself. Though she suffered flare-ups throughout her teens and 20s - including one so bad she was hospitalized - she says she still did her best to ignore it. When she heard the diagnosis arthritis, Turturro, then a teenager, didn't take it seriously. "When I went to school, just getting up out of bed really hurt me." "I was crying and my father had to carry me," Turturro recalls. She tried to walk down to the water, but she felt like the stones on the beach were piercing her soles. Turturro was 12 when she had her first flare-up. "Once it develops, the odds are that person will have to deal with it for the rest of their lives." "Rheumatoid arthritis for most people is a chronic, lifelong progressive illness," Klippel says. ![]() As the disease progresses, joints become swollen, inflamed, painful and stiff. Unlike the many other types of arthritis, rheumatoid arthritis mainly strikes women between the ages of 20 and 45.Įarly symptoms include fatigue and fever. Over time, the inflammation can damage nearby cartilage, bone, tendons and ligaments, leading to permanent deformity and disability.Īn estimated 1.2 million people in the United States have rheumatoid arthritis. John Klippel, medical director of the Arthritis Foundation in Atlanta. "What we don't know is why the immune system would choose to do that," says Dr. Doctors don't know the cause of the disease, but they do know that the immune system attacks the lining of the joints. Rheumatoid arthritis is a painful, chronic disease that causes inflammation of the joints, most often in the hands, feet, wrists and neck. "I can help people by saying 'I have it too. They want to hear what you have to say," Turturro notes. "When you're in the public eye, people relate to you. The 40-year-old actress is making public her battle with the disease as the spokeswoman for "Joint Effort Against Arthritis," an arthritis awareness campaign sponsored by the Arthritis Foundation and Centocor, a company that makes a well-known arthritis drug. The much-anticipated series opener airs tonight. Turturro, who plays Tony Soprano's conniving sister, Janice, on the HBO series, has suffered from rheumatoid arthritis since she was a child. 15, 2002 (HealthDayNews) - If you had seen Aida Turturro smiling like a movie star at the premiere of "The Sopranos" fourth season at Radio City Music Hall last week, you wouldn't have been able to tell she was in pain. Editors and writers make all efforts to clarify any financial ties behind the studies on which we report. All of our articles are chosen independent of any financial interests. HeathDay is committed to maintaining the highest possible levels of impartial editorial standards in the content that we present on our website.
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