[Gregg Kirkwood]

66 years ago I hit the deck along with a twin sister and 4 years later I was a statistic of the Polio epidemic that was sweeping parts of Australia.
At that time I was in bed for months and to this day I could not get a direct answer from family if I was affected by polio or some other disease.
26 years ago I was diagnosed with "Post Polio Syndrome" and joined the "guinea pig" programme in NSW researching into this new condition. From the waist down the symptoms were all there...burning feelings, numbness, fatigue, cramps and aching all in the lower limbs. Neurontin and Madapah seemed to help for awhile but of late it did not seem to work at all and I went off medication.

Perhaps it was a condition of PPS and I just had to get use to it. It was a case of my perception of 'normality' on pain control rising every day to the point that I had no idea what 'normal' was.

A new GP and a different approach. He sent me to a Neurologist who conducted nerve studies and other tests and also arrange for me to have an MRI of my spine and brain.
That was the game changer.

The neurologist said that I definitely did not have Polio as a child but I did have the biggest arachnoid cyst that he had ever seen. The cyst measures 10.8 x 10.6 x 5.6 centimetres and takes up quite a chunk of my scull and is pushing the brain well over to one side.
Time will tell if surgery on the cyst will alleviate the pain and other conditions I have been putting up with for years. The pressure pain in my head has certainly intensified over the past few weeks and the neurosurgeon is still 6 weeks away.
Has anyone else had a cyst this size and what were their symptoms?