My husband suffers from idiopathic pn (2 yrs) in his feet. He feels now & since it happened (he works in a hospital OR & was pulling a heavy laser out of a truck and felt a pull in his back) that it has something to do with his back. He has had tests done seen specialists been to PT & no one agrees. But every time he does a specific move or pulls a heavy object his feet flare up? All he takes for pain is Lyrica. He is also now on Zoloft because of depression. He is a strong man and continues to work every day but is frustrated because no one in the medical field believes him. Anyone else ever have flare ups due to heavy lifting? or pulling?

Thank you all for your replies. I guess I just figured everyone was like me and had these symptoms all the time so hearing about "flares" confused me. I now know that is not the case.

Even though I have symptoms all the time, those in my feet get worse if my feet are really cold.

Sometimes things ease up during the day. I really hesitate to use the word better because I have before and then people think my neuropathy is gone - ha, don't I wish

Think after years of trying my thyroid values are finally normal, for now anyway. But I don't think Graves had anything to do with PN>

Natalie when I read your post what came to my mind was shingles too, like mrsD.

Thanks again for your replies!

Oh - never thought of this until I read this topic.

In 2003, had shingles. Only a very few lesions, with the most being in the area just below the right collarbone, a few others just outside the right armpit and another few over the right upper scapular area.

Was Rx'd cortisone and Valtrex my a Cleveland dermatologist, which I took - the worst part of this story being that I had to leave within days to drive myself and my Sheltie 1100 miles to Florida where we were moving. The burning was during this March trip was unbelievable, and my skin had gone fairly red. Ran into a Emergency Medical Service guy at the front desk of the second hotel I stopped at and asked him what could be causing this red/burning? He said possibly the combination of cortisone and Valtrex, but he suspected Valtrex.

After stopping the medication, the redness gradually disappeared but I was left with what the Florida doc called post-herpetic neuropathy for which I took neurontin. After some months on it, I woke up one day not being able to focus my eyes and the inside of my head felt so strange I can't even describe it. I stopped the neurontin cold-turkey, even though I knew I shouldn't. I soon realized the neuropathy was gone, and I had no ill-effects from the cold-turkey stoppage.

Even though my January 2010 onset of NLD SFN has decreased to bearable levels over the past six months or so, I now get mild "flares" that I attribute to the the stronger sun and warmer temperatures for the most part. Probably a bit to certain foods and stress.

My question is whether or not these "flares" might also be caused by the fact that I'd had shingles/resultant neuropathy. I tested negative for shingles recurrence when first Dx'd with neuropathy last year.

Thank you,

Sheltiemom

I think the shingles virus is very sneaky.

You could try taking some l-lysine and see if that helps. If it does, then the virus may be a strong trigger for you.