Providing Answers, Support and Hope in Georgia

Thirty-One Faces of Hope: Antonia and Sean Green

The lupus community includes people living with lupus, friends, family and supporters across Georgia. For Lupus Awareness Month, we would like to highlight some of our lupus heroes and champions. 

Antonia and Sean Green

Antonia
7 years into our union and with just over a year of being parents, I was diagnosed with SLE lupus. WE now had a chronic illness. Even though I carry the diagnosis, this has been a shared condition from the start. 

Almost 2 years later to the date of my diagnosis I had my first Discoid flare. We were put to the test. My moods swayed like the wind, but my husband was my constant. Whether taking care of our daughter during one of my hospital stays, or caring for me at home, my husband has become my built-in support system and caregiver. 

Lupus has crept its way into every aspect of our lives from intimacy to parenting. It has changed our perspective and provided us with lessons and blessings. 7 years in and we are growing and I’m continuing to heal. We’re in love, with lupus! 

Sean 
With the diagnosis, I was given a new title. Caregiver. My first thought was fear. I was fearful of how this illness would affect my wife and how I would have to raise our child on our own. I also experienced guilt for the selfishness that I was feeling in not wanting what we had to change. I knew only slightly some of the effects of lupus, but I understood death was real. 

I had lost a close friend to the disease shortly before our wedding. I felt shame too for those initial feelings. My/our perspective soon turned as we were faced with flares and hospitalizations; we still had a daughter to raise and a future to build. Growing up watching the dedication that my grandfather had for my grandmother and helping to care for her in her golden years, prepared me long before I knew it did. 

Balancing home and work were enough but adding lupus pushed me to what I thought were my limits. I now had to contend with everything from mood swings and medications to missed income. Watching my wife battle this disease fueled my fire and cemented me to her.

My selfishness turned to hope as I saw although changed, we were still on the path TOGETHER. It hasn’t been easy but having a warrior for a wife makes being in love with lupus that much easier. 

-Antonia and Sean Green