Hello all, this is my first post and to say I’m scared is an understatement.
I’m a man in my late 40s and all this has come on so quickly, literally this month (August 2019). I started getting random sensations on my body during the day, like something was crawling on me. Then the bottom of my right foot started to ache and felt tender and by the time I went to bed my toes were tingling and so were my arms. Whatever position I laid I had pins and needles in my arms, feet and legs. The next day was much the same but with electric shock sensations on random spots on my body and face, like I was being prodded with an electric zapper. Then the next night the back of my left thigh quivered all night, it was visibly moving and I got the odd involuntary jerk movement on my hand and legs. I’ve also had a buzzing sensation in my groin. At this stage I had googled the symptoms and everything came back to MS or neuropathy caused by diabetes (I’m not diabetic).
I went to the doctors and they sent me to go for blood tests and a chest x-ray, she didn’t seem overly concerned. My blood pressure and heart rate were perfect. The bloods came back a few days later and are ok, they are waiting on the glucose test and x-ray but the doctor said they weren’t concerned about diabetes as that would have been picked up by now. They suggested I went to the optician too which I did and the optician said he couldn’t see any sign of nerve damage in my eyes.
On my second doctor visit it was another doctor who again didn’t seem concerned and said he didn’t think it was MS, he got me to squeeze his fingers with either hand and he held my ankles and got me to push and pull against his hands and then he touched either side of my leg gently to see if I could feel anything (I could). He said it was likely stress but he would refer me to a neurologist if I wanted him to.
For the first time in my life I’ve had a very stressful year and have lost a lot of weight (not that I was overweight) and stress was something I went to the doctors with several months ago but decided against taking anti-depressants as I hate taking pills. In the last few months I have picked myself up anyway so I wouldn’t say I was stressed when these symptoms started but the doctor said it could still be stress related.
I have been very lucky that my neurology appointment because it has came through already, albeit in 5 months time. I understand some people go years without ever getting a referral so I can count myself lucky on that although I have no idea if they do an MRI that day or if its another 5 month wait !!!
The tingling isn’t as bad as it was when this started but I still get pins and needles in my feet if I sit down or cross my legs. The random sensations have calmed down too although they haven’t stopped completely and I’m still getting to odd spasms on my arms and legs. I am also getting an odd sensation on the back and side of my head now though but not headaches.
I’m trying to convince myself its stress, a pinched nerve or something that can be easily sorted. The trouble with googling stuff is you only hear of the bad stories.
Sorry for the long post. So will they do an MRI straight away when I go for my appointment? Any chance it could be something else?
Thank you for reading.