Hi,

I just got diagnosed with PN by an EMG after a several months of neurological symptoms - tingling and prickling in the hands and feet (mainly soles and palms), weird crawling sensations, occasional sharp stabbing pains, and intermittent weakness. The doc is searching for potential causes now but I have none of the usual risk factors, and he even told me it's likely that the eventual diagnosis will be idiopathic.

To be honest the symptoms are still fairly mild and intermittent. My symptoms all came on within a few weeks and have been fairly stable since. However the knowledge that PN is generally lifelong progressive, and I have a long life ahead of me (I'm only 27), scares the hell out of me about my future.

I know each case of PN is different and no one can tell me how my PN will progress, but I've got a few general questions:

(1) I've read some people say it gets better and easier with time, but how can that be if the symptoms typically get progressively worse over time? Or is it that you just learn to live with it better? Still hard to believe if the physical symptoms tend to worsen.

(2) Does progression always reach an end state of severe pain and disability that seems to be just about every case I read on here? I've read studies that estimate the prevalence of PN to be anywhere between 2 - 8% of the general population and 30+ % of diabetics. Those are extremely high numbers. The vast majority must be functioning well with PN, right?

(3) Power of attitude - I keep seeing everyone say this, and I know it to be true. I'm of the anxious type though, hence the worrying about my future even though the PN is so minor at the moment. I'm not really sure what I'm asking here, but just how do you deal with the mental stress of having a chronic and potentially debilitating illness? I've had clinical depression in the past, no episodes for several years, but I can feel myself slipping towards that again as I worry about my potentially very dark future...