Thanks, Annie. As my disease progresses, I am starting to wonder if it's MG at all. I'm wondering if it fits the LEMS picture better. The specialist I'm going to see in May ought to know.

What makes me tilty seems to be my hip muscles. When it's bad, the back-and-forth motion of walking sends me too far in both directions. It seems to me that normally, when you take a step with your right foot, you sway slightly to the right--but your left hip muscles clench and stop you from swaying too much. Mine don't clench well, so I just keep going until I either catch myself or crash into something. At least that's what I think is happening. I tilt from the waist up, but if I tilt too far, my whole body follows. That's when I crash into walls.

That's why the canes are so helpful. I stick them way out to each side, like those supports you see on a truck with a cherry-picker, or like flying buttresses, and they keep me from tilting too far in that direction.

My upper arms are weak, but only mildly. My other big problem is what I thought was my neck, but now I'm thinking may be more my upper back/shoulders. I have no trouble chewing and swallowing, and my eyelids are fine. I was having a bit of double vision, but not since I started the Mestinon.

My doctors keep testing my potassium, because I take HCTZ as a diuretic to prevent migraines (not a typical treatment, but it has worked wonders for me!). I see that HCTZ is a treatment for hyperkalemic periodic paralysis, too, so I have a good start, huh. Well, I've never been a smoker, and as far as I know I don't have cancer. But I know that half of LEMS patients don't. So it's something to consider.