Sjogren's syndrome discussion

Hi I haven't been diagnosed yet and have an appointment in a few weeks to hopefully get diagnosed and treated. I have been suffering a while now and after not knowing what was wrong with me and thinking at first I had cancer or thoracic outlet syndrome, now after doing more research and typing in my symptoms I was like yes this has to be what is it is. Many doctors don't know about this. My symptoms are: dry lips, dry eye & problems, neck pain, bulging vein in neck, redness in neck, mouth issues- thrush and now other things added as I see gum issues, on/off bronchitis, fatigue, feeling unwell, itchy neck, easily bruising, brain fog.

I just went to Emory hospital recently as my neck pain was unbearable and I tried to tell the doctor about other issues and was told they can only treat one thing and not to speak about everything and was cut off. They also do this when I go to my primary care doctor and urgent care. So I have not been able to discuss all my problems. My doctor is young and looks at me like I get on his nerves and they don't return emails or calls from me anymore. It's very frustrating to not get help you need and for doctors to take you seriously these days or not want to hear about it.

I'm 48 and I was having some peri issues like hot flash, headaches, heart beating issues so I started taking hrt cream- estrogen and progestren and I did that for 2 years and it made those issues subside and I stopped taking it recently after I read it may not be good to take over a long period of time for various reasons. Then I read an article https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2018/05/180531131116.htm that says estrogen can make you have autoimmune issues and wondering do you think that could attribute to sjogren's ? I have been having failing health issues since 2019 before it wasn't as bad.

I had neck muscle issues at times & fatigue, but not so many things like now. Now it's so many as I listed my symptoms above, so I'm thinking the hrt has exacerbated it also 2019 I had a tick bite which caused lyme's disease, got over that then in 2020 I caught covid then had bronchittis over and over, pneumonia and so for the last 3 years I have been sick on/off. Was also told I had asthma given steroid inhalers because coughing/lungs was bad. Taking steroids led to oral thrush now my thrush has never went away and now my teeth gums look different and mouth is dry all the time. By the way my lung issue is fine now and no asthma, but I feel so unwell. I'm glad I found this forum. I'm in Georgia in USA and need to talk about it. Thank-you for reading and replies are welcomed.

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