I’m coming up on 9 years. I remember I had stepped on a rake, just like in the cartoons only instead of hitting myself in the face I hit my brachial plexus, I remember it hurting like hell for weeks, then about a month later I did it again on the same spot. I don’t know if that was the actual incident which started my symptoms, because the onset didn’t occur for six months; I lifted weights frequently for years and had overly developed shoulder and chest muscles. I also started playing racquetball just before my symptoms peaked. It started with a lump feeling in my throat, stabbing ear pain, jaw pain, tongue, teeth, and a tight collar feeling, and then it spread to my collarbone, middle chest, upper back, armpit, index finger, forearm, and thumb, also the pinky finger at times.

CT scans had revealed stretch marks on my ride side sternocleidomastoid but the doctor felt that it had nothing to do with my pain and sent me to PT twice to no avail. I’ve seen so many doctors and tried just about everything short of surgery. I feel like one of the patients on House.