First of All, I am so glad I found this forum, my husband was diagnosed with Trigeminal Neuralgia 1 week ago. It all started about 2 weeks ago with a "tooth ache" he, whom does not have a cavity, thought that at his 43 years of age got his first cavity, me not having one tooth without filling insisted that I had never suffered so much pain for a cavity, not even now that need to go in for a root canal treatment. On December 25th the intense pain got him out of bed, the next morning we made an appointment with the dentist who took 4 xrays and told him he had no cavities, and maybe he had an ear infection or had a sinus problem, since he explained his pain was on the right side of his face, it was 1pm and we decided to go to the er, they did a cad scan and decided he needed to be transferred to a hospital where a neurologist could see him, they thought he had a stroke or was about to have one, because the cad scan showed what appeared to be a block vein and they related is facial pain to a stroke. After being transferred to a trauma hospital and get an MRI done, the doctors said he had no stroke, although he had a vein that was considerably larger that on the other side, but they said that his pain was not related to that so they finally diagnosed him with Trigeminal Neuralgia, which after reading some of the threads here now makes sense, but was very scary at the beginning, specially because we have never heard of it. We didn't leave the hospital until December 30th, the doctors explained to us about the type of medication he would have to be in, the anticonvulsant and also and antidepressant, they prescribed gabapentin 900mg 3 times a day, and amitriptyline 25 mg 1 time per day. Is being about 10 days now and he felt like the pain has not gone away so the family doctor prescribed Lyrica, but insisted he needs to see a neurologist. We still have to visit one, we also have to make an appointment at a "headache clinic" in Philadelphia.
In some way I think we have being lucky that he was diagnosed fairly quick without loosing any tooth, but at the same time, I hope that we find the right medication for him without getting into other issues due to the side effects, ( I am in shock with the possible side effects of some of these medications) and to be able to control the pain, is devastating to see him suffer and not being able to help.
Thank you so much for taking the time to write about your own experiences, it does make a difference in people like us, knew to this and not knowing where to turn or what to do.
thank you