From worry to words: Doctor living with lupus defies odds and writes on

From the time she was 10 years old, Monica Hardie knew she wanted to be a doctor.

Growing up on a farm near Dixie, south of Dayton, she knew she would have to work hard, but she was determined.

After graduating from Whitman College in Walla Walla, the first in her family to graduate from college, she went on to medical school at the University of Washington. She did a clinical practice in Walla Walla for three years, then worked at a Spokane hospital for the next three years.

As she continued to practice medicine, her body was changing. Finally, doctors diagnosed her with pituitary tumors and Hardie underwent brain surgery, but surgeons only discovered small clots. As she recovered, her aches and pains continued, and her fingers turned from blue to white when she held something cold. At age 36 and after a year of tests, Hardie was diagnosed with lupus. That was 10 years ago.

Lupus is an autoimmune disease where the body’s immune system becomes hyperactive and attacks normal, healthy tissue. This results in symptoms such as inflammation, swelling and damage to joints, skin, kidneys, blood, the heart and lungs.

“Lupus is a lot like multiple sclerosis in that it affects your body in different ways,” Hardie said.

People can have a mild form of lupus where they can take a drug once a year, keeping the disease at bay.

But Hardie is at the other end of the spectrum.

“I thought I could practice, that it would go into remission,” Hardie said.

But six months after her diagnosis, her doctor put her on partial disability and four months after that, she was on full disability.

“I wanted to be a doctor since I was 10,” she said.

“I knew about lupus because I had taken care of patients with the disease,” Hardie said.

“I was more shocked than anything because doctors don’t get sick,” she said. “I was shocked it was a major, potentially dangerous, disease.”

Hardie attacked the disease by undergoing four rounds of chemotherapy.

“It was an experiment for lupus,” she said. “It put me in remission, but made me very, very sick.”

She lost “a ton of weight,” she said, going from a healthy 140 pounds down to 90 pounds.

She said the disease also changed the dynamics of her family.

Her husband had always been a stay-at-home father and was raising their two girls, ages eight and 10 at the time Hardie was diagnosed.

When Hardie was placed on full disability, suddenly her husband had to be the bread winner.

As the disease progressed, it began to attack her kidneys.

“The typical lifespan is six to eight years,” Hardie said.

Her marriage crumbled and Hardie moved to Colfax to be near her sister, who lives here, and her mother who lives in Pomeroy. Her daughters are going to school in Spokane.

Hardie continues to defy the odds, but a year and a half ago was in hospice.

“I had continued to lose weight, be nauseous and have continuous gastro-intestinal problems,” she said. “I was living in constant pain. I stopped all medications and thought ‘This was it.’”

After almost a year in hospice, her lab tests improved and she started eating and gaining a little weight. She started taking mild medications and was released from hospice.

“I’m concentrating on my quality of life not the quantity of life,” she said.

Although she’s still in pain and taking a lot of medication, Hardie has found the one thing she likes and can do is write.

She started writing seven yeas ago and published a young adult novel five years ago. She is 95 percent done with a 128-chapter novel titled “Lifeboat.”

“Eleven more chapters to go,” she said.

She used to write outdoors at a park, but as the weather got cooler last fall, she knew she had to find a another place to write.

Hardie said she knew Events on Main owner Kari Rimbey in high school and asked if she could do her writing in the coffee house.

“It’s good because you wake up and know you have to be somewhere,” Hardie said. “Writing is a good pain distracter. You have to buck up and focus things outward. It’s like an office away from home.”

Hardie writes at a table near a front window of Events from 9:30 a.m. to 2 p.m. Monday through Saturday.

She manages by taking mild medications during the day and stronger ones at night.

“I was lucky,” she said. “God opened all the right doors.”

Living with lupus is very stressful, Hardie said.

“Family is so important in our lives,” she said. “You definitely find out who loves you.”

“Of course I had plans. It just took me a little while to get here. Like all of us, we never know what’s going to happen,” Hardie said.

“I pray every morning that God will keep my eyes open to help people. Really, all our actions have effects on people,” she said. “We have to live one day at a time.”

“I don’t know the future,” Hardie said. “I’ve outlived all the predictions. My doctor tells me I’m a special case. We just take it as we go.”