I am not a medically trained person, so please take the info below as a personal story and nothing else. I'm a male, almost identical age to yourself and developed BMS about 3 months ago after very stressful life event. Not pleasant, as you are well aware. I have (like many others) researched extensively. Over the past 3 months, I've moved forward quite positively ( a fair way to go still !). At the start, my whole mouth burnt - hard palate & soft palate, right across throat. Now things have settled down a bit and main pain is across (some of) hard palate, partic either side above maxillary teeth. I (had) have the form that ramps up during the day, although over the past 2 weeks or so, it has been more constant (although lessened intensity) through the day. Reading the more recent papers about BMS primarily being related to nerve ending damage, I have developed the following approach:
1. Address my underlying high stress events - regular massages, more exercise, meditation, a couple of sessions with a psychologist and sorting out personal issues. For me, I think this is a crucial part of the issue.
2. Early on, the burning sensation was very intense, although I read an article from Uni of Ohio (I think) about some of their patients gaining relief by regularly applying (initially quite diluted chilli paste for 40 secs as a mouthwash & spitting out, see below, I can't paste a link as I'm a new poster ). There is method to the madness and I gained no benefit from this for about 10 days, but kept doing it 3 X per day. I now credit this with considerably reducing the burning sensation to a more acceptable (still a bit uncomfortable) level. Am now going to change this to brushing affected part of hard palate with a much more dilute chilli suce with fish oil - applied by artist paint brush, so that the rest of mouth is not subjected to the chilli and to see if any benefit from direct contact of fish oil to affected mouth tissue.
**
3. Have been placed on (short term) Diazepam to assist in reducing anxiety (as per above).
4. Stopped alcohol consumption entirely.
5. Alpha lipoic acid - daily 3X200 mg Aiming to continue for at least another 6 weeks, then maybe drop to 200 mg for another month.
6. Acetyl Carnitine at a level around 3 g per day, after reading some studies about regeneration of nerves in rats supplemented with A-L-Carnitine and some studies in AIDS patients with peripheral neuropathies.
7. Co-enzyme Q 150 mg per day (I gather this is really poorly absorbed from gut, so maybe useless?)
8. Most recent edition has been to take anti-inflammatory doses of Omega 3 fatty acids - fish oils, after researching their well documented anti inflammatory, worth reading about "resolvins" in fish oils - try Google.
8. Taking usual range of B Vitamin supplements & trialling a variety of additions - an iron / B Vit tonic & phytonutrients.
Summary of progress: I'd suggest 3 months ago I had a VAS score of perhaps 7/10 with widespread BMS across hard palate, soft palate & throat. After all of the above, I'd now rate (over say the past 10 days) a VAS score of around 3/10, contraction of area affected to perhaps 1/2 hard palate only, with some generalised (modest) pain through maxillary teeth (similar to kids having braces tightened on teeth). Still a long way to go, but certainly making progress. Hope this helps some others battling this very unpleasant condition.
Let me know any progress you or other readers have had on managing this very unpleasant condition.
This site (below) appears to be the most comprehensive site re BMS that I have come across.
**
Hope this helps - Numbat