This Is MS Multiple Sclerosis Knowledge & Support Community

Hi all, I am new to this site. I have not been diagnosed with MS as of yet, but I'm being put through some tests to get to the bottom of what is going on.....

My story in a nutshell, I'm 28, female, with no children. I have been having a variety of symptoms for the past five months including bladder incontinence, muscle spasms/stiffness/pain/twitching, some left sided weakness, some patchy burning and tingling sensations in my legs, chewing and swallowing difficulties, nasal speech (sounds like I have a cold), and also several instances of the sensation that I have burned or scalded my tongue.

I have been checked for Vitamin deficiencies and I don't have any. I am currently being checked for heavy metal poisoning. I have had two EMG's - the first one was done a month into symptoms and was normal. The second EMG was done 5 months into symptoms and showed some mild nerve damage in my left arm and leg, which I was told by my neuro was "essentially normal" and not the cause of all my symptoms....

Just curious, How did all of your MS symptoms start? I have read a lot of stories about MS and it seems like in the majority of cases, people have problems with their eyes ...... A lot of my issues started with bladder incontinence and spastic, twitchy, painful muscles .... and now the burning, tingling, chewing, swallowing issues are happening.......

Any of you have an initial MS symptom occur with the muscles (twitching, spasms, stiffness)? or bladder incontinence?

I am scared because some of the symptoms seem to fit the bill for MS but a lot of them seem to fit with ALS ........ and unfortunately, in my situation, I have to play the wait game even more than the rest because I have a pacemaker, so I can't just waltz in for an MRI - instead ,taking the very slow approach to figure this out ...... Friday, I go for an evoked potential test, which I'm sure will be abnormal given the fact that my last EMG showed signs of nerve damage .... which, I know, isn't part of MS (I have read that people with MS usually have normal EMGs) ....

Anyway, any thoughts or comments are more than welcome!

Nice to meet you all.

-Angela.

Hello Angela

Bladder trouble was an early symptom for me. I couldn't pee for 12 hours, it cleared up, I forgot about it for a year but troubles came back. Hesitancy/urgency. Although my first symptom was optic neuritis and my second trouble with walking.

I have experienced some of your other symptoms though. Problems swallowing and slurred speech were a real issue three years ago. These symptoms began to slowly improve after a year or so and now they are completely gone. Bladder problems have also improved over the last few years. Problems walking, on the other hand, have got much, much worse.

It definitely sounds like MS to me. Besides ALS is much rarer, even more so at your age, so I'd just put it out of my mind. Mind you, before I was diagnosed (I can't have MRI either) I was worrying about ALS too.. The nice thing was that when the MS diagnses finally did arrive it was a welcome relief..

All the best.

hi ct, welcome to TIMS

if your docs are doing regular tests and your results fall inside the normal range they will tell you you have no deficiencies..

BUT, ms patients have a range of nutrient differences in their blood, compared to values found in 'healthy controls'

if you care to send me the results of your nutrient blood tests, with units, i can tell you if you are in the healthy zone or the ms zone of the 'normal range'.

key tests: 25(OH)vitaminD3, vitamin B12, zinc, magnesium.
nice to know: uric acid.

there are more but those top four are a good starting point.

they probably tested your serum albumin too, i'd be interested to see that number also..

to illustrate what i'm talking about here is one example of the problem with standard nutritional bloodwork:

at my local lab the range for uric acid was something like 140-360 when i first suspected i might be off, and got tested. initially i was reassured to see that my level was 194.

then i read more and learned that the average uric acid level for ms patients was 194 umol/L, with the average relapse level in the 160s and the average remission level in the 230s. i updated the uric acid page of wikipedia accordingly (after declining a sustained battle with the content nazi on the MS wiki page).

it turns out 'healthy controls' have uric acid up around 290-300 umol/L.

ttfn!