I have RRMS and I don’t know if anyone else experiences this, but I find that I have very strong physical reactions to stress and shocks, far in excess of anything that can be described as normal. For instance, if I receive an email from someone regarding something that causes me stress, my entire body seems to have a muscle-clenching spasm and I sometimes feel as if my body is giving me little electric shocks. Also, this weekend we discovered a (thankfully slow) leak in the bathroom, but it involved lifting some of the floor. I did only a little in the way of physical stuff, but afterwards even though I didn’t feel physically tired, my body was shaking, my balance was affected and I had a (thankfully quite mild) migraine. It’s as if my body is translating these quote minor stresses and shocks into something enormous.
If anyone else suffers this or knows how to moderate the physical reaction, it’d be good to know.
I’m sorry you’re not going to like my answer, but I think it’s a normal part of the disease, and there won’t be much you can do about the physical reaction, although you might be able to use techniques like meditation or cognitive behavioural therapy (CBT) to try not to get so stressed about things… Won’t help with physical stuff like lifting floorboards, though.
I often quote this one, but I vividly remember, not long after diagnosis, being literally weak and shaking, over such very mild stress as some over-pushy friends trying to invite me round for dinner, when I didn’t want to go. Rebuffing an unwanted invitation is hardly the biggest challenge we face in life, but I felt as if I was going to fall down! What made it worse was the lady herself has MS. I’m sure, if they had any idea they were exacerbating my symptoms, they would have let the matter drop. But it was: “Oh, please, you must come: X would love to see you…” (emotional blackmail) and so on.
I couldn’t believe my knees were wobbling over people just trying to be friendly - it wasn’t even an argument - just somebody being a bit over-enthusiastic, and not realising I felt pushed into a corner.
I get like it too. I’ve always been on the anxious side, but primarily for me, because of the physical symptoms of stress which seem so extreme in relation to what’s actually quite a minor trigger. Sometimes its like a whole body shock! My neuro says it hyper-sensitivity, I’ve got really hyper reflexes, am ultra sensitive to medication, and my body just over reacts. So its not the mental anxiety/stress which is that extreme, but rather my body’s physical reaction to it which is!
Meditation techniques do help a bit, and as Tina mentioned, CBT can be helpfull, but its that instantaneous ‘‘woomph’’ of shock/panic/dread/adrenaline that’s a little harder to cope with. The other stuff helps with the after effects rather than prevention I think.
I have to say that I have found some relief since starting on beta blockers. They were prescribed for migraine, but the very welcome side effect has been a dampening down of the other stuff.
Thank you for your replies. My dad has SVT and that is controlled by betablockers, so whilst I don’t have the racing heart element, I wondered whether I might have an issue with adrenaline, so will speak with my docs about it. Whilst it’s a disturbing sensation, it’s only really caused an issue this time as I was so wobbly and with the migraine I took the following day as a sick day and I don’t want to be doing that for something that just seems silly!
I can really relate to this. Inland revenue have put my body into overdrive, every symptom is made 10 times worse. This makes my concentration rubbish and then I can’t fill in forms. But I’ve been in tears before over dropping things and other silly stuff. I’ve also found that noise really bothers me and is painful. The biggest culprit is the self service checkouts at sainsburies. Its just too loud! I really have become a wimp.