My husband has psoriasis and has been suffering with the affliction for about 12 years now. Lately, it has graduated to psoriasis arthritis, which means it isn’t just an inflammation of the skin, which is the general characteristic of psoriasis, but it has also now inflamed his joints.

It isn’t easy living with the disease. Hubbie has had his moments when the pain would just be too much. A bottle of Advil, Tylenol and every other pain reliever would always be by our bedside table. And somedays, it doesn’t help anymore. So you could just imagine how much we’ve prayed for a relief from the illness.

About three weeks ago, because of a very good doctor‘s perseverance to help people like my husband, he has gotten an ok from his medical insurance to take Enbrel. It’s a biologic medication which is injected under the skin. Its a type of protein that helps block TNF or tumor necrosis factor, which is overly produced by a patient’s immune system. And I have to say that Enbrel works like a miracle drug for my husband. The arthritis pain just went away and the patches of red skin from his body are slowly clearing up. The itch is still there, but it has gotten less and less everyday. I cannot believe that only a few weeks ago he had a hard time walking already because of the inflammation of his knee joints.

We’re not really sure how long he has to stay on the medication tho. We have heard of cases where some patients had to switch medication after some time because their systems had gotten used to the drug and need a change. But for now, I’m really happy that the drug has given my husband his life back. It’s something I will always be thankful for everytime I wake up in the morning.

The picture below was taken last October 6, 2007 while heading for the meeting place of the National Psoriasis Foundation‘s Walk for Awareness held at Washington, DC. Hubbie enlisted to join the walk.