Or should I say, anxiety, dipression and irratability. I am Mere and have posted before. Thank you for your support.

I am in the process of having a neurologist figure out what is causing small fiber neuropathy - peripheral and autonomic. The skin biopsies were taken last week.

I would be very interested to know if any of you affected with neuropathy suffer mental disturbances as a direct result of the neuropathy. My symptoms wax and wane and when they become severe, I seem to have a lot of mental instability. And while I understand that feeling this way will bum anyone out, this seems somehow different... it is definitely a pattern as I have been ill with this for about 20 years.

I become extremely anxious, even during sleep and commonly wake up from anxiety and/or sadness. This feeling stays with me during the waking hours.

These feelings dissipate when the physical symptoms stabilize (somewhat).

Could it be from high levels of catacholemines in my body from my autonomic system? It is so very difficult to deal with as the physical symptoms are terrible and I do not want to start the antidepressants again if I can help it... Just one more medication...

Mere

P.S. Hope you all are staying warm.

Many things can cause how you feel from medications to simply letting your thoughts and fears get the best of you.... especially at night, which magnifies your symptoms.

Are you physically able to exercise and do it regularly? Exercise helps relieve symptoms and gives you a way to fight back beyond just taking the meds. When I feel really bad, exercise makes me feel better even though I may not feel like doing it that particular day.

Have you tried breathing exercises or even yoga to help calm your anxiety?
Are you drinking enough water and taking supplements properly?

It's good that you're working with a doctor on your diagnosis, but you have to take charge and determine what makes you feel better or worse on any given day with any given symptoms... it's not an easy process!

Pay close attention to what foods you eat and drink and when, your physical activity level, and what you do that makes you feel better or worse during the day. Take notes if necessary which might help you or your doctor see a pattern that might otherwise be overlooked or missed.

Hope this helps....!

It is quite possible that fears could exacerbate the anxious/depressed feelings, but sometimes these feeling just precede a flare. Almost like an aura before a migraine. Very strange.

I do exercise as I am able to. I know it helps, but during the flares, I tend to not to exercise because I get tachycardia, bad shaking and near to pass-out w/postural hypotention. Also, I can barley move my legs.

I do drink plenty of water and am careful with what goes in my mouth. I suffer from migraine and gastroparesis, so intake and proper nutrition a very important to me. My neurologist has started me on therapeutic levels of Alphalipoic acid and carnetine. He is waiting for my methylcabalamim lab to see whether I require B12 injections or sublingual lozenges.

I suspect it may take time to see positive results, if any, from the supplementation. My neurologist says it takes about one month, or so.

I do so appreciate your reply. Thank you for reading, Meredith

You should see some relief of symptoms with taking Alpha-Lipoic Acid and the L-Carnitine. I'm taking the OTC version, but it has helped me a lot. I saw almost immediate relief and lessening of some symptoms, but the full treatment benefits come over time even though we as humans sometimes get impatient with the waiting game.

Also as a suggestion, you might want to look into drinking Aloe Vera juice which has many health benefits. Some people may not necessarily agree, but I drink it every day and feel that it does help, especially with calming the stomach and digestive system.

Thank you for the feedback Starglow. I ordered my supplements from i-herb based on references made on this Board. It would be like a dream come true if they help and what you say is hopeful. Also interesting about aloe vera, I will read-up on it.

My problem has been slowly worsening over time... about 20 years. It started so acutely with a host of autonomic problems after a bad monoclonal infection, then slowly improved over about five years. After which I was diagnosed and treated for autoimmune spondylarthropathy and FMS. I have also had chronic and intermittent neurological problems since the improvement, but this past year, I had two acute episodes and was diagnosed and hospitalized for gastroparesis. The GP was accompanied with postural hypotention, tachycardia, flushing, angina, intermittent fever, bladder dysfunction, arm pain and numbness, numbness in my face and mouth, migraine, tingly and painful feet, extreme weakness, etc. - all of the acute things that happened 20 years ago plus some other things.

My gastroenterologist felt that the autonomic symptoms had nothing to do with my gastroparesis and sort of brushed them off. Not so easy to brush off when it is happening to you. Well, I knew better and after so many years, I found a pattern.

Until I went to a new neurologist hoping to get some control on the daily migraine and post migraine neuralgia (arm pain and pins and needles for four months now), I was sort of lost with the complex symptomology. The new neurologist found that the neurological exam was abnormal and my conduction/emg study showed a borderline abnormality in my leg of large fiber demylation.

The neuro feels I have small fiber neuropathy. Apparently, finding the cause is difficult, if it can be found. He has ordered a lot of blood work (listed in a previous post).

I am very fortunate to have found my neurologist, a doctor who looks at all of my physical symptoms together as a whole, rather than looking at things separately. A lot has been missed over the years because of 'piecemeal vision.'

Sorry to ramble but thanks for reading... Mere

My symptoms just started two months ago with random numbness and tingling in my hands and feet. Then it changed into cold and burning feet.

Luckily I stumbled onto this board and benefited greatly from the wealth of knowledge and experience found here. I read and followed the advice given, and now my feet have stopped burning for the most part, although I do still have intermittent symptoms. But I have learned how to massage my feet and do foot exercises which help greatly when symptoms flare up.

I have started doing daily exercise and my hands rarely have any tingling now and the problems are mostly in my feet. I still have problems sleeping through the entire night, but I think that will get better with time and treatment. I also signed up for a beginners yoga class and hope that will help too with relaxation techniques and keeping me focused on end goal.

I'm working with a neurologist but I don't have any diagnosis yet. They ran blood tests last week and called me earlier this week wanting to run another ANA profile, so I'm not sure what's up with that yet. I see the doctor again on Thursday to go over the test results. I had no prior health issues, so I hope that works n my favor towards making the necessary lifestyle changes to reverse this situation and allow my body to heal in time.

I know some say that full recovery is rare or maybe not even possible in most cases, but I firmly believe the body can heal under the right conditions. I'm determined to beat the odds and refuse to allow this condition to control me or my life.

hi there

As a long shot, have someone screen you for autoimmune disease. Lupus can include mental instability due to the disease affecting the brain, plus it can cause PN

BUT: it would also be causing joint pain/swelling, skin rashes etc etc at the same time, and you don't mention these. But it would be worth having someone run an ANA anyway, preferably when you are experiencing these symptoms. If it was positive (and to be significant it needs to be a good strong positive like 1:320) then further testing would be warranted.

Like I say this is a bit of a long shot as you have not reported any other symptoms and lupus is a systemic disease, but it is probably worth running an ANA anyway.

hth
raglet

You and i appear to be in the same age range..... 40-something, so just thought i'd drop by. You've got alot of wonderful feedback already.....so many people here are so caring and i've found this forum a place to get better advice from than any amount of 'Doctors' so to speak....

Neuropathy is a mysterious cohort to say the least. My daughter was the one that brought to my attention that she noticed a sort of 'pattern' or 'cycle' with my bad days/pain flares. I've always been pretty vulnerable to depression and insecurity throughout my life....but in these past few years when the neuropathy became my 'identity', it was discovered in labwork that my hormones were completely depleted and i had severe hyPOthyroid.....
Just wondered if you've had a thorough thyroid check. ?

You've found a wonderful place to get great info.....I'm not the real 'intellectual' type by all means, but i sure can relate to your frustrations as a woman fighting for a decent quality of life.....

All my best
Rae

It is interesting that the gastroenterologist said that the gastroparesis had nothing to do with autonomic symptoms, mine says it has everything to do with them. The vagus nerve is one if the biggest nerves involved with the ANS and it rules the GI system. One can have issues with the GI system that are not autonomic, but usually those would be due to some fibrosis.

GERD, esophageal spasm, motility disorders are all autonomic.

Anyway on your initial question about how you feel, I think that one can feel oddly due to either the parasympathetic or sympathetic overactivity. Most of my odd feelings, such as intermittent profound feelings of sadness upon waking, etc. were due to meds that didn't agree with me.

First thing I would look at is ANY meds. Secondly, then I would take a look at the autonomic system. That said, there is little that can be done other than crank it down with beta blockers, if they are tolerable. I can tell you from experience, it doesn't pay to use much in terms of drugs, since the ANS gets messed up worse.

I do hope you feel better soon.

Thank you all so much for your help... I have had quite a bit of testing for thyroid problems and do see a rheumatologist for connestive tissue disease and spondylarthropathy. I am on humira pen and a small amount of prednisone (3 mg) for the arthritis. My neurologist has also repeated testing for lupus, scleroderma, sjogrens, etc. and as I understand the skin biopsies will also be tested for inflammation.

I guess I just need to try and relax, it will be another month before my next appointment. Then, all the results will be back...

I hope everyone is having as good of a day as possible. Mere