Did you ever suspect....?

missvicki · Posted: Tue Jan 08, 2008 2:56 pm Post subject: Did you ever suspect....?

Just curious, if anyone else ever suspected they had MS long before their dx? I was dx when I was 45 years old but I questioned it as far back as 35. I can't even remember why but I can remember thinking "do I have MS?" and "no, you'd be way sicker, don't be a hypocondriac!". Just wondering.... Confused

Jim_P · Family Member Joined: Dec 19, 2007 Posts: 99

My theories were alcoholic neuropathy or MS, a year or more before I actually got diagnosed.

I weighed on the mass consumption of alcohol, and was in denial about the fact that I probably did have MS, from all the reading I did.

DM · Posted: Tue Jan 08, 2008 9:28 pm Post subject:

I was officially diagnosed 07/07. I was totally floored when I heard that. I had no clue whatsoever that was the problem. My initial, and only event, occurring 11/06 led some DRs to believe that I had experienced a stroke. Well, after seeing the MRI, the neuro duggested that it was MS.

For me, quite a shock although I hve had no issues after my 3 week stint late last fall.

jimmylegs · Family Elder Joined: Mar 12, 2006 Posts: 1999

personally, i suspected, tested, confirmed, was documenting, and was half-assedly treating, b12 deficiency. the treatment stopped working around the time of my attack which was really freaking me out. they said it wasn't working because now it was ms. they didn't test the rest of my b-complex but it occurred to me these things come in a complex for a reason so i took a crapload of other b vitamins and improved dramatically in a couple of days. i have gradually improved since but have incurred some damage that's probably going to be permanent, ie spinal nerve conductivity. i think i am an atypical case because my diet was abnormally limited prior to the dx attack. whatever the rest of my ms is about, there was a big chunk of reversible malnutrition going on there too. wrong food, mega stress, caffeine, alcohol, not enough water intake, it was just bad all around.

MattB · Posted: Tue Jan 08, 2008 9:53 pm Post subject:

I always had some weird symptoms and wondered what it could be. All through my childhood up until now once in a while I'd get this thing where if I moved my head too quickly the inside of my head would get extremely hot and sometimes my tongue would go numb. It was very temporary but I went to the dr. anyhow, they found nothing strange after a few different visits. A year ago I barely hauled myself out of the water(the ocean nonetheless) before I collapsed. I almost drowned and the Dr. still didn't know what's up. I figured at that point something was DEFINITELY wrong. I didn't figure on MS but I knew something was up. Nothing got noticed for me until my ON episode.

TwistedHelix · Posted: Wed Jan 09, 2008 7:43 am Post subject:

Strangely enough, I had a sneaking suspicion I might get MS years before my symptoms started, although that was probably just fear. When they eventually did begin, my symptoms closely matched those of my mother's, so I had a pretty good idea. After two years of tests, (diagnosis was much slower in those days), the neurologist congratulated me as if I'd just got a question right in a quiz show!
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Dom

Lyon · Posted: Wed Jan 09, 2008 9:27 am Post subject:

At the diagnosis appointment the neuro asked my wife if she'd had any preceding symptoms which would lead her to believe she had MS because she had at least seven lesions on mri.

Two years after diagnosis we still can't think of any legitimate reasons to have suspected MS earlier, although in the preceding years my wife had odd health concerns in which testing had been inconclusive (wife was diagnosed at 46).

Ten or fifteen years before MS diagnosis she had heart palpitation's which was diagnosed as "supra ventricular tackycardia", which is kind of a non specific way of saying that we don't know why you're having heart palpitations.

Between 3-5 years before MS diagnosis she had gone through testing for panic attacks, which concerned her because they were so bad that she would have to pull to the side of the road with the kids in the car and it was happening periodically.

A year or two before her MS diagnosis she had gone in for cardiac testing several timed due to tightness in her chest which always led to inconclusive results. It wasn't until 6 or 8 months after her MS diagnosis that I read about "MS hugs" and at that point I started suspecting that MS hugs were responsible for the tightness in her chest she had experienced.

Bob
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Wife diagnosed with MS in Feb. 2006 and is a participant in the Tovaxin IIb clinical trial.

whyRwehere · Family Member Joined: Oct 04, 2005 Posts: 87

My husband and I were shocked. Never suspected anything, but after a long time, I realised there were signs in the past, if nothing dramatic:
A limp, which he denied that he had
A bit slow in reacting to things
Very tired after work...would fall asleep on the couch
If he didn't get enough sleep, his brain didn't function very well...confused
Could become emotional/tearful, when we parted for a long time...I used to fancy he was really missing me, but I think it was just a reaction to stress.
took forever to urinate
When he needed to go, he needed to go....
So, you see, all those are symptoms, but they weren't as obvious as when he started to fall over and couldn't walk about 10 yrs later. Now he walks with difficulty, he really should have a cane...would love to arrange for him to get one of those walkaides...it would really help his commute to work, but we can't afford one.
No one in his family had/has MS, and if they did we would have cottoned on a lot sooner...I suspect his mother's chain smoking might have affected him, or maybe because he grew up not too far from a nuclear power plant, or maybe his diet was not great...or maybe he has a bacteria....everything is a possibility and worth considering.
WRWH

Loobie · Posted: Wed Jan 09, 2008 11:02 am Post subject:

I had absolutely no clue until my first bout of ON. I was actually playing in a racquetball tournament when my ON first appeared. I was totally caught off guard. However, during the 8 months it took to firmly diagnose me, I had researched it enough to suspect MS. I only had ON for quite sometime (a year or two) and thought I was going to have an easy go of it. HA! That's what I get for thinking.

jimmylegs · Family Elder Joined: Mar 12, 2006 Posts: 1999

stupid ms hugs. i had that.

Wonderfulworld · Family Elder Joined: Aug 28, 2006 Posts: 291

I remember lots and lots of things for the last 17 years at least but just put it down to stress, hangovers, viruses etc. Started believing I was a hypochondriac myself.

A week where I couldn't walk in a straight line? - oh exhaustion. Double vision in one eye only? - oh a virus. Dragging my foot - another virus. Severe pain in my shins when walking in certain flat shoes? - growing pains, so common in teenagers! Collapsing for no reason at a bus-stop? - oh I must have been on a diet - except I wasn't. Shakes in my hands and legs? - too much ventolin inhaler or all the cigarettes I was smoking. Pain that didn't respond to normal painkillers? - psychosomatic. Feeling exhausted? - stress. Going through bouts of having to pee all night? - all in my mind, just relax and you'll be ok.

Finally I started working in a new job and the woman training me in had MS. She told me she had it and I remember sitting beside her saying "that's how I feel a lot of the time". She said gently "that's how I feel ALL the time". A year later and she was visiting me in hospital as I was paralysed and gone deaf on one side and then the neuros really couldn't dismiss me as having stress or depression or anything but MS.

I even had frequency and bladder infections as a 4 year old. And weird things with my eyesight by age 8. My Mum remarking on my "funny" run - one strong leg, one weak leg. Could it have been there then?

Lyon · Posted: Wed Jan 09, 2008 5:44 pm Post subject:

Hi WW,
Of course you're aware of childhood MS, which has the reputation of being more progressive because the evidence has always "seemed" that way.

I guess an alternative way of looking at the situation is that when MS is progressive enough to be noticed in childhood, it's of course going to continue it's progressive course and present us the picture that "childhood MS" is a horse of a different color, whereas a milder course, with the brain's plasticity doing it's best to keep damage from being noticed along the way, might not become obvious for another 15-30 years.
Bob
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Wife diagnosed with MS in Feb. 2006 and is a participant in the Tovaxin IIb clinical trial.

scoobyjude · Posted: Wed Jan 09, 2008 10:03 pm Post subject:

I started having symptoms that i tried to ignore in 2000, about 4 years before my first big attack. I did some research and everything pointed to MS. I knew it in my heart but didn't fully accept it till I was dxed in 2006 after another mild relapse. I even went through a year with one of my doctors telling me I definitely did not have MS, all my problems were muscular. I was dxed 2 years later. Wish I could see him now.

missvicki · Posted: Thu Jan 10, 2008 1:00 am Post subject:

After my last relapse and a couple of months before my dx, I was watching Larry King and he had several guests on that had MS. I called my Mom and said "turn on the tv!"...."that is what I have!" Bummer.

MrsGeorge · Family Elder Joined: Dec 11, 2007 Posts: 238

I had ON for the first time in May 07 and looked it up online.... that opened up the MS can of worms as an option and it hasbeen uttered as apossibility by docs since. On Tues it was declared a probability but I still have no dx.

Before the ON hit I had little things that made me wonder if I had a problem but decided I was just being a hypochondriac!