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hmmmmmm where to start. . . .
I
am married, will be 30 years this july. Have 3 children and 2
grandchildren. I had been having problems off and on for years but
never connected any of it . In my teens (mid 60's) I started having
severe dizzy spells in school all Drs said nothing wrong, perfectly
healthy, so i just managed and continued with living.
In the late 90's I started having trouble with my hands and arms.
Was dropping a lot of things and sometimes after work couldn't get arms
to do anything but hang there, like they weren't getting message from
brain. Went to neuro, who insisted it was carpal tunnel and kept giving
me pain meds even though I told him I had no pain or numbness. He
finally gave me trigger point injections in wrist, now I have pain!
Which lasted a few months. I never went back to him and refused to see
another neuro.
Feb 2001 I woke with pain in right eye and no vision in that eye.
Scared me to death so went to eye dr. He said I wasn't passing
peripheral vision test but didn't know why. He said I should see a
neuro or eye specialist. Went with eye specialist but couldn't get
appt till April 25th. On March 12th I had a severe dizzy spell that
dropped me to the floor. Even though I could see and hear everyone
around me, if I tryed to move or speak the nausea and dizziness got
much worse. This only lasted a few mins and then I was fine. Went to
GP Dr and he said I should see neuro. Ok, I was scared enough I
agreed. The neuro, because of my family medical history, ordered a MRI.
Appt was april 26th.
Well, went to eye specialist April 25th and he said optic neuritis
probably caused by MS. Went for MRI April 26th hadn't been home 5 mins
and neuro called from out of town on her cell phone to tell me she
wanted to see me and my husband in her office first thing in the
morning; that the MRI showed a possible brain aneurysm. Turned out it
was 5 of them and both neuro and neurosurgeon said they were not what
was causing my symptoms, but they needed to be fixed before we could
continue to test to see what was.
Had 2 brain surgeries to repair 4 of the aneurysms (5th one was
inoperable it was incased in bone and they said even if it did leak or
burst it shouldn't hurt me.) About 6 weeks later my legs got real
weak, and i needed cane for walking in house and wheelchair for
anything further. Went back to neuro for further testing.
Even though my MRI and LP both came back ok she had ruled out other
reasons for my symptoms. Using the exam she gave me and medical
history she believed it was MS. This was Dec 7th 2001. She informed
me that she was going to send me to MS specialist in Dallas because she
was moving her practice down state. A week later she was gone and she
hadn't made that appt and she never sent my medical records to my GP
like I asked her to.
My husband was retiring and we were moving to New York so I could help
take care of my parents. So I waited to see a neuro up there. He
examined me and agreed with my Texas neuro that it was MS. He also
believed that those dizzy spells I had as a teen was the start of it.
He told me they were vertigo. He said since I have had MS that long
and doing that well he thought going on one of the crabs might rock the
boat and we decided not to go that route.
I have had many other symptoms and neurological deficits over the years
that they used to make this dx but I wanted to write a intro, not a book
lol.
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