Does anyone else have severe wrenching charlie horse type spasms at night in their neck and shoulders?
I know I have SFN (diagnosed biopsy), but I can't find any reason why my neck and shoulders should be in this state. I think my doctor is missing something. Six months ago when I woke up like this, an MRI showed herniated cervical disks and was being treated for them by a local orthopedist. Then pain started shooting through out my whole body so I was sent to a neurologist who said the herniated discs were pretty normal degeneration and that it was "something attacking my spinal cord". At hospital I had another full MRI of brain and spine and spinal tap (all pretty normal). Discharge diagnosis of inflammatory autoimmune neuropathy and sent on my way to for biopsy for SFN. Once they found that they were done with me and just offer nerve drugs. I just can't find any info anywhere about neuropathy doing this to someones neck.

i get those type charlie horses in my legs. taking slo mag has helped a great deal. i only have them once in a while. might be worth it for you to give them a try.

I get a lot of muscle spasms and cramps body wide, including my neck and back. My SFN is non-length dependent so I have come to accept that the twitching and cramping can show up anywhere. The worst is when you have a knot so large under your shoulder blade that you cannot turn your head to the side due to the pain. That and when I stretch, involuntarily, when sleeping and my calves cramp up. Wakes me up from a dead-sleep every time.

There is a journal article about this that you can find online (I cannot post links yet, sorry). Do a Google search for "cramps small fiber neuropathy" and it will come up at the top result. Two of the authors of that study (Harms & Lopate) are the neurologists that I see for my SFN. Essentially they describe it as, "...damaged small nerve that excite intramuscular nerves." I hope this info helps. Hang in the Healthgirl, you are not alone!

Regards,
SFN Warrior

The magnesium is needed for many processes but I might add that potassium is historically helpful for spasms. Even though I don't get into very much fruit, I always eat a banana once in a while. Also try to get in those eight glasses of water or more. I had a bout of constipation w/Hydrocodone and had to pay attention to quantity. I felt better on more than one aspect after that. Good Luck, Ken in Texas.

I get spasming in my legs, but not in the manner you state. Mine is a slow tension the creeps in, tightens eventually like someone twisting a garrote and when it lets go the muscle is very tender and sore.

All the above advise is great, I follow it, but yes in my experience spasms happen.

My best,

Jon

I'm prone to cramping in my legs and feet more than my upper body, but I do have odd twitching in my back muscles right along my spine that I never had before the SFN hit. Twitching in my legs is the norm.

Here's a link to the abstract of the research study referred to in a previous post:

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/23813593

When my SFN came on I had full body twitching even on the left side of my neck that drove me insane. I also had terrible knots between my shoulder blade and neck that made turning my head difficult. Every muscle in my body knotted up for no good reason.

I even remember about 6 weeks into this terrible disease I had the worst charlie horse that woke me up from sleep at 3am - my leg launched up into the air on its own accord and had me on the ground writhing in pain.

Hello Healthgirl,

I get muscle spasams in my neck, scapula, lower back and calves.
I use a compund when it is really bad, but I have had a LOT of success with an over the counter Analgesic gel called Sore No More. Its for the most part all natural. I would highly recommend trying it before any mag lotion or anything else I have tried.

http://www.sorenomore.com/

I looked up Sorenomore.... it contains capsaicin ...which some of us cannot tolerate because of the burning it causes.

I'm glad for you that you like it, but others here who know they don't like capsaicin should avoid it.