--the searing, bruning pain ones--have been slowly receding over time (though I'm still prone to flares there that start up very rapidly, hang around days to weeks, and then disappear with the same rapidity), I do get intermittent tingles and shoots that are not painful so much as annoying. I have attributed them, and my neuro tends to agree, to a cerain amount of permanent damage to my nervous sytem that results in my being far more prone to compressive symptoms than a normal person would be.

For instance, my recent muscle tear in my right shoulder has resulted in numbness/tingling symptoms in my right hand (thumb and index fingers and back of the hand extending over to the space between middle and ring finger--a medial nerve distribution). These symptoms are quite distinct from my usual painful ones, and are likely due to compression of the C6/C7/C8/T1 nerve root area, or compression of that nerve further towards the throacic outlet. I am still waiting on results of cervical/thoracic MRI's (though I'm still trying to get them to MRI the shoulder itself). My thinking is the muscle tear moved the shoulder blade into a position in which it compressed the nerve somewhere--possibly several somewheres. But I also believe it's quite possible I would not be having these symptoms, or having them to this extent, if my nerves had not been compromised to some degree by my initial syndrome.

Wings and I have both speculated that anyone who has nerve damage from any cause is far more likely to have compressive problems with their nerves in the future, with compressive symptoms that "normals" would not get or not get to this extent. This is well-documented for neuropathy from diabetes, but we suspect it may extend to neuropathy from almost any cause.