[Blessings2You]

I was just thinking--we've been over this before, but it's been a while. Especially when you're newly diagnosed, or still looking for a diagnosis, it's pretty easy to chalk every new symptom up to MS. Of course, sometimes it IS MS.

Sometimes, however, it could be a big mistake to say, "Oh, another stupid MS symptom." NEVER just say, "Now stupid MS is giving me the worst headache of my life" or shortness of breath, or chest pain/discomfort, or a funny lump, or excrutiating pain in my leg, or weird vision stuff.

Sure those things "could" be MS, but people with MS are also allowed to have strokes, heart attacks, cancer, DVTs, or detached retinas. Is it an odd little rash on your knee? Your pinky goes numb once in a while? Probably can wait until the next doctor's appointment. But anything that concerns you, or you know can also be a symptom of something emergent, PLEASE run it by your doctor to be sure!

[Lynn]

I couldn't agree more with this one. I used to be like that at the start - I think we all are to some degree, but nowadays, I exclude every other possible thing before I bring MS into the picture.

Sometimes it is too easy to 'miss the woods for the trees' - and then it can be too late if it is something that needs urgent assistance.

Lyn

[Kitt]

Originally Posted by Blessings2You

I was just thinking--we've been over this before, but it's been a while. Especially when you're newly diagnosed, or still looking for a diagnosis, it's pretty easy to chalk every new symptom up to MS. Of course, sometimes it IS MS.

Sometimes, however, it could be a big mistake to say, "Oh, another stupid MS symptom." NEVER just say, "Now stupid MS is giving me the worst headache of my life" or shortness of breath, or chest pain/discomfort, or a funny lump, or excrutiating pain in my leg, or weird vision stuff.

Sure those things "could" be MS, but people with MS are also allowed to have strokes, heart attacks, cancer, DVTs, or detached retinas. Is it an odd little rash on your knee? Your pinky goes numb once in a while? Probably can wait until the next doctor's appointment. But anything that concerns you, or you know can also be a symptom of something emergent, PLEASE run it by your doctor to be sure!

I totally agree. The same is true for CMT. Some like to blame everything on CMT and they don't think that they can get anything else. It's just all CMT. Not true of course. Thanks for your post.

[Kitty]

Most of my health issues are NOT from MS. Go figure..........

[SallyC]

When I first had MS, in my 20s, it was my only illness And of course it caused all of my grief. But that doesn't mean other things haven't cropped up over the years, in my 70s now, that called for action, other than a DMD.

See your PCP often.. He/She is the one who keeps tabs on your General health. If its something to do with MS, the PCP will send you to your Neuro. I don't even have a Neuro anymore.

[Mariel]

I have a handful of diseases which sometimes produce similar symptoms, so I can't always tell and my doctors probably wouldn't try. But I know that my worst symptom now is very bad leg and hip neuropathy. I am trying everything I know, but have not got it under control. I do a lot of praying lately, and I am stymied. I have seen the pcp recently, as you suggest, Sally, and she doesn't have very good answers, but is sending for various tests. Her changing my diuretic and potassium intake just produced a potassium deficit, which I've had before. I am an experiment in progress so I don't blame the pcp. If I blame doctors it is the meatheads who didn't dx me when I was younger.

[freeinhou]

I cannot emphasize this subject enough.

I was dizzy and had a pain in my lower back in 2004 on a Friday afternoon. My first thought was "what's MS doing to me now?"

Fortunately, I didn't succumb to this thought. I went to the hospital (via ambulance). Turned out it was an ascending aortic dissection. Or, in layman's terms, my aorta had torn where it attaches to the heart.

Open heart surgery really sucks when you're a smoker and you got a smoker's cough during the recovery...

Tom