Patient Stories Project
Finding Balance: Michael’s Path to Wellness with Rheumatoid Arthritis
Written by: Michael Kuluva and Dawn Richards.
Michael Kuluva is a fashion designer, patient advocate and has been living with rheumatoid arthritis (RA) for 15 years. RA is a chronic autoimmune disease where people experience painful inflammation in their joints. RA looks different for different people, and even in the same person RA can change from day to day. Michael splits his time between Toronto in the summer and Los Angeles in the winter, as he has found that his RA responds better in winter when he is in a dry, warm climate.
Being physically active is important to Michael, and he keeps active to help keep his RA in check. He’s noticed that his inflammatory markers in his blood are better when he’s able to be active. He also notes that his mental health is greatly impacted by whether or not he’s able to be active.
Michael is a retired professional figure skater, and while he doesn’t skate much now apart from the odd rollerblade, he aims to walk everyday somewhere between 10-12,000 steps. If he can’t make the steps one day, he’ll add them on to another day, aiming for about 300,000 steps per month. Michael has formed a habit to make sure he walks every day, even if the weather isn’t great, he walks on his treadmill at home.
Living with RA has affected the types of exercise that Michael does – something he’s learned to adapt to over time. For example, the hardness of pavement or ice make rollerblading or skating difficult for him. On the other hand, exercising in water is easier on his joints and helps his movement. He also loves to stretch and do yoga. Practicing yoga for over 25 years, he’s now completed 100 hours towards his yoga instructor certification. One of his goals in becoming a yoga instructor is to help others with limited mobility to find ways to be active, for example through doing chair yoga, etc. Practicing different types of yoga over the years has helped him see its benefits from an overall health standpoint. He knows yoga and stretching have helped his joints through alleviating tension and pain.
RA affects Michael’s abilities to move. Exercise helps keep his joints flexible and also helps with the pain and inflammation he experiences. He says he listens to his body each day and knows that each day is different. Sometimes he can’t be active because of the pain he may be experiencing and he says it’s important to be easy on yourself about.
Michael’s go-to resources for helping with nutrition and exercise are people with expertise in these areas. Instead of going online for resources, he prefers to engage one on one with experts so he can ask lots of questions and have responses tailored to his own needs.
When Michael reflects on his journey of living with RA and aiming to be active, he says that when he was first diagnosed with RA, he was really hard on himself. First, he had to come to terms mentally with his diagnosis and to deal with side effects caused by the medications he was put on At this time, it was difficult for him to be active. However, over time, as he worked with his healthcare providers to find the right medications for him, he was able to start being active again. He started simple with walks around the park. He takes walks now with his dog.
He told himself “OK, this is what you need to do to regulate your mental health and then that will help your physical health.” This helped him really take things day to day and to be easy on himself about where he was each day.
Michael has found that it’s best for him to have a routine given his chronic disease. He feels it really helps his mental health and in keeping things constant, it’s then easier to tell if something isn’t right. Having a routine helps Michael know where his baseline is and when it is off.
Michael shares that it took him 15 years to get to this point. He acknowledges that everyone has their own journey with chronic illness and his advice is that you need to be kind to yourself, listen to your body, be patient, and you will get to where you want to be.
