Mystery electric shocks / jolts below the neck

[slay2k]

I'm a 36y/o otherwise healthy male living in the tropics of Puerto Rico.

Truth be told I have no idea if this could be MS but I'll be having a brain MRI done shortly. Cervical MRI was fine, Thoracic showed a benign hemangioma and small disc protrusion T7-T8. I have no other MS symptoms (no weakness, no tingling or numbness, etc) so I am not convinced it is related, but I'd like to know if anyone here can relate to my symptoms.

Current symptoms: muscle fasciculations up and down my body, although none above my neck that I can tell. Mild, sometimes disappear for a few hours but mostly ongoing.

In my abdomen and lower abdomen area, it (or something else) feels like someone tapping me with a finger. Several times a day -- and this is the worst by far -- these taps will turn into an electric zap / jolt that startles me and has me jump up with a wince, increasing heart rate, etc. This makes it difficult to relax throughout the day.

I can feel the twitches / bumps more when laying down, so I'm a bit scared of going to bed at night because they either become more noticeable or just get worse.

I have a 2-month history of dealing with this. It started off pretty bad with huge electric jolts every few minutes that decreased in frequency over time and went away almost completely after a few weeks (I've also made huge diet changes that now exclude dairy / gluten / processed foods / etc).

For about 2 weeks the fasciculations also went away, but now they're back along with a miniature version of the jolts. Rather than posting my entire wall-of-text history of dealing with this, I just wanted to know if ANYONE out there experienced something similar?

Suffice it to say I have been to several ERs (bloodwork and abdomen CT is fine, take some Valium and see a neuro), neurologists (your neuro exam is normal), GIs (no parasites in stool, but you have scar tissue from 35 years ago in your lower abdomen, let's do all kinds of crazy colonoscopies and tests which I passed on), etc and everyone has their own opinion but nobody has diagnosed it. My stomach / digestion / everything is completely fine. The valium really helped once or twice when I needed it, but makes me super sleepy and I want to fix the underlying problem instead.

I can't be the only one to experience these symptoms...?

[lyndacarol]

I'm a 36y/o otherwise healthy male living in the tropics of Puerto Rico.
…
Suffice it to say I have been to several ERs (bloodwork and abdomen CT is fine, take some Valium and see a neuro), neurologists (your neuro exam is normal), GIs (no parasites in stool, but you have scar tissue from 35 years ago in your lower abdomen, let's do all kinds of crazy colonoscopies and tests

Welcome to ThisIsMS, slay2k.

What tests were included in your blood work? A 25-hydroxy D test? I realize you are "living in the tropics of Puerto Rico," but if you are living a Western lifestyle (working indoors, wearing clothes, using sunscreen), it is still possible to be vitamin D deficient. Vitamin D deficiency can result in neurological symptoms, such as you describe.

[slay2k]

What tests were included in your blood work? A 25-hydroxy D test? I realize you are "living in the tropics of Puerto Rico," but if you are living a Western lifestyle (working indoors, wearing clothes, using sunscreen), it is still possible to be vitamin D deficient. Vitamin D deficiency can result in neurological symptoms, such as you describe.

Hi there. Yes 25-Hydroxy D test showed 28.8 on a 30-100 scale, so I've been supplementing with Solgar's 10,000 IU D3 Cholecalciferol, although not religiously.

[lyndacarol]

Hi there. Yes 25-Hydroxy D test showed 28.8 on a 30-100 scale, so I've been supplementing with Solgar's 10,000 IU D3 Cholecalciferol, although not religiously.

At 28.8 ng/mL, your vitamin D level is frankly deficient. The California-based group GrassrootsHealth (http://www.GrassrootsHealth.net) currently recommends a person reach and maintain a level of 40-60 ng/mL.

See your doctor, but 10,000 IU of D3 sounds good; it should be taken EVERY DAY, in my opinion (I have no medical backiground).

[slay2k]

Yeah, the only reason I wasn't taking it daily is because that 25-D measurement was over a month ago and I didn't want too much Vitamin D in my system.

I've also had a level of 5ng/mL when I lived in Los Angeles and didn't experience these symptoms (started supplementing after I found out).

[lyndacarol]

Yeah, the only reason I wasn't taking it daily is because that 25-D measurement was over a month ago and I didn't want too much Vitamin D in my system.

I've also had a level of 5ng/mL when I lived in Los Angeles and didn't experience these symptoms (started supplementing after I found out).

Vitamin D is needed by virtually every cell in the body. If vitamin D is deficient, symptoms can compensate for a while, but then things will start to break down.

If your level was down to 5 ng/mL, the "tank" was definitely empty for a while and your body was compensating. (And, at 28.8 ng/mL, it is not full yet!) Even when the level is optimal in your blood, it will take some time of maintaining the level to correct the body system that was compromised.

Your doctor needs to monitor with tests every 3-6 months for a while; then, once or twice a year.

It is virtually impossible to overdose on vitamin D; there had been NO cases of vitamin D toxicity at blood levels less than 200 ng/mL.

Carole Baggerly of GrassrootsHealth interviews Dr. Robert P Heaney on vitamin D intake (7 min.)


Dr. Heaney of Creighton University, a world-renowned vitamin D expert:
@2:15 The answer is yes, it's safe. That 10,000 international unit, 15,000 international units, is about what you would get with 15 min. in the July sun at the beach. We know that that's safe, that nobody has gotten vitamin D intoxication from sun exposure - they might get sunburn - but they don't get vitamin D intoxication; so, yes, that's safe and it's important to stress that; it's physiological; that's what we would have gotten as the human race was developing in equatorial East Africa…

@4:20 We now know out to at least 40 or 50,000 international units per day it is very unlikely that anybody, even the most sensitive, most responsive individual, very unlikely that anybody would get into a potentially toxic range.


Dr. Cedric Garland, another world-renowned vitamin D expert:
Dr. Cedric Garland - Vitamin D & Kidney Stones (21 min.), October 2013:


@13:58 Are there any negative health consequences from taking too much vitamin D in supplements? There is a famous story of a man who formed a company that sold vitamin D, by accident, in quantities of 2 million international units per pill. He took it - his friends, his family did - and they all were fine for several months. As it came closer to a year, he noticed that he wasn't feeling as good as he might, there were vague complaints. And he scrutinized the bottle, and he saw that the bottle contained 1000 times as much vitamin D as was appropriate… The condition did reverse itself; there were no fatalities.

@19:30 He recommends serum level of 80-90 ng/L for women, people with MS.

[slay2k]

Thank you lyndacarol, I will continue to take the supplements daily and am also reading about B12.

Unfortunately I don't see solid links between Vit-D deficiency and the intermittent shocks that I am experiencing, but I suppose anything is possible. I'm actually having trouble finding anyone with my symptom of fasciculations, some of which feel electric around the abdominal area.