Hi,
If you are reading this then thank you in advance.
I am a 45 year old female. Back about 6 years ago I started experiences crippling chest and upper back pain in work. It felt like I would imagine the beginnings of a heart attack would and was very scary. I put it down to 10 hour shifts on my feet all day and the physical nature of my work grooming dogs. I tried to ignore it happening and it settled down after a few months. When I spoke to my GP he prescribed omaprezol suggesting it was gastric.
The mess didn’t work and eventually he referred me to a gastroenterologist after I kept getting regular bouts of constipation etc. The gastro theorised it was IBS and put me on amitryptiline.
By this time (2015) I had also been getting increasingly fatigued, with aches in my limbs, difficulty walking (like climbing a mountain or wading through treacle). I also began to get sudden bouts of crippling head pain where I felt like my head was falling off! With all these symptoms my GP referred me to a rheumatologist suspecting I have fibromyalgia. The rheumatologist was very dismissive and sent me away with a leaflet on fibro.
Around a year and a half ago I started getting blurred vision, phasing vision, thinking I could see movements in my peripheral vision when there was nothing there, sharp pinprick flashes of light in my vision, problems focussing and aching in my eyes. I had eye tests at the optitian but they found nothing.
I had a CT scan last year that the GP said was “normal”. He therefore puts all my symptoms down to fibro.
Recently I have had 2 “falls” when out walking making a total of 4 now in 2 years…I am only 45!? In the last 3 months my vision has deteriorated again, I have been getting bouts of dizziness and was at the cinema last week and felt I was walking like I was drunk in the dark of the theatre. Most troubling is a new symptom of inner vibrations. They began about 3 months ago in my right foot and felt as if I was stood on a vibrating surface but I wasn’t. They lasted a couple of weeks before moving into my buttocks. I am still getting these. I also had the most weird feeling a few days ago like my torso was tremoring, but it wasn’t, I also get this feeling in my head but it is not outwardly visible.
On Friday I finally plucked up the courage to go to my GP but when trying to make an appointment was told it was emergencies only that afternoon. When I asked why I was rudely dismissed but the receptionist told me the doctor would phone me. Early afternoon the GP called me but was obviously curt and annoyed when I answered. She sharply informed me the surgery that afternoon was emergencies only so what was my problem? I very briefly told her of my new symptoms and she immediately dismissed them as just nerve activity. It seems now that everything I experience is not taken seriously by my GP and simply put down to fibromyalgia without further investigation.
i am not convinced though and feel a real ‘progression’ in my mobility difficulties and all the symptoms I experience. I know that often MS is wrongly diagnosed as fibromyalgia and I am concerned that my Doctor is missing something. I have bouts of short term memory problems and other cognitive issues which began around 3 years ago too.
In all of your experience here, I was wondering your opinions about wether my experiences sound like possible MS? And where I can be directed to for help seeing as my GP doesn’t want to know.
thank you again, if you have made it this far reading my long story then I salute you :). Xx