Hi, and welcome. Always feel free to ask questions here. We understand how scary it is to be undiagnosed--and how scary it is when you get a diagnosis, too.

Myasthenia gravis is caused by antibodies your immune system mistakenly makes against your neuromuscular junctions. The antibodies block or damage the cells on your muscles that communicate with your nerves. The blood test you had was probably looking for the most common kind of antibodies that cause MG (AChR). If it came back negative, though, it doesn't mean you don't have MG. There are other antibodies that cause MG that they can test for (MuSK) and some new antibodies that have been discovered recently that there aren't tests for yet. Sometimes people get diagnosed with MG even though no antibodies have been found in their blood (we're called "seronegative").

When you see the neurologist, he will probably give you a drug called Mestinon (generic name: pyridostigmine). It is a fast-acting drug that helps a lot of people with MG. If it works for you, it's more evidence that you have MG. He should also send you for a special kind of EMG called a single-fiber EMG. This is a very specialized test that not all neurologists know how to do. A lot of us who are seronegative have been diagnosed after having a SFEMG.

I can't tell from your symptoms if you have MG, but it certainly sounds like a reasonable guess, and you should definitely have these tests! There are a lot of good treatments for MG. Please let us know how it goes.

Abby