Anyone have issues with clothes? Or am I the only odd ball, LOL.
 

I don't mean just can wear something that drives you nuts, I mean it just seams to hurt to be on you.

There are times I can't stand things around my waist. This ones doesn't happen often but when it does it last a few days at a time (and I never have a stomach ache or anything going on like that at the time).

I haven't been able to wear a bra in 5-6 months (I wear cami's when I go out with a top or sweater over them, I don't run around in tops that it's clear I'm not wearing a bra :p ).

I can't wear tops that have elastic of the sleeve, even if it's not tight.

Somethings just hurts me and I don't know why, seams like I can't have clothes that touch me snugly.
I have to make sure my jeans are lose enough on my tights because if there not and I wear them by afternoon my tights are itching and tingling.

When I first started having numbness in my thigh and hips (and later on, legs) I couldnt wear denim.

I still cant wear certain types of denim. Levi's and Lee jeans bother the heck out of me. I found some really nice jeans at KMart last year that I wear all the time now. Not sure of the brand, but they're elastic waisted and dont drive me banannas.

I used to like to wear velvet button up blouses, but discovered around Xmas that my skin doesnt like that any more. :(

Also, wool used to bother me, I crochet and knit, and it used to be that I couldnt stand touching wool. Now, depending on the brand of yarn, I can touch wool and it doesnt itch me any more. (weird!) I've got some alpaca wool now that I'm knitting a scarf with, and I've actually been able to wear another scarf that's 50/50 wool and acrylic.

Socks, that's my biggest problem. Especially my right foot. The socks can't be to tight or thin. They spin around my foot, literally, I don't know why. Also it feels like the sock material is caught between my toes, but to look at it, I know it's not. Weird stuff.

:hug:

Oh socks get me too, but that one has always bugged me and it's like the other clothes thing were something hurts for no real reason.

Socks are still one of the clothing items that I can still really enjoy wearing. One of my favorite things in this world are brand new terry cloth socks. I love brand new socks. They have to be terry cloth tho...I cant wear any fancy socks.

I'm learning to knit socks, but I dont think I'll ever be able to wear home made socks, so I'm not in a big rush to start amassing a collection of knitted socks.

Based on your description, the cause is more likely sudden bloating (water retention), or perhaps an allergic reaction (to your laundry detergent, or whatever).

The reason I say that is because your problem seems to be intermittent (few days), long-term (8 mo), and in areas that are particularly constricted (bra, waist/thigh area). Also, although some of us would relate to having some sort of problem in this regard, the sensations you describe ("itchiness", "tingling", undefined "hurt") are not how most of us would describe our "clothing" issues.

The neurological "itchiness" that one gets from MS is concentrated to one or many very small and defined spot(s), not a large area or large patch of skin. It would be like a mosquito bite itch, with nothing visible, and it is very distinct/describable. The skin "hurt" feeling is not usually concentrated to areas such as the "bra line" or "waist area" either.

Additionally, MS clothing 'weirdness' generally comes accompanied by other specific 'MS-weirdness' that you don't currently have.

Cherie

I know your just trying to help in your own way but it comes out as you pointing out that I'm wrong, your right every time. :( You tell me every time how something isn't MS. I don't feel like your giving helpful advise when you tell me how what I'm saying isn't a MS thing.

Don't know if this will help but I get the MS hug. The bottom of my bra seems to cut across one of the ribs that is being sqeezed. But instead of the skin feeling irritated, it is more of a pressure deep surrounding my ribs. Some times my waste band, if it is fairly high, also seems to cause the pressure to feel greater. This may not be close to what you are describing.... hope it helps. Good luck.

I'm sorry that you feel that way MX7.

Since you don't have a dx YET, I thought you were wondering if a particular sensation that you are experiencing is most "likely" to be MS. I didn't realize it was a competition for right and wrong, and that you already had a position on that.

I will continue to answer all inquiries as honestly as I can though.

Cherie

This hurting feeling it's like my skin is hurting (other any on my left hip, I have burning pain and I don't like anything to touch that area). I really don't know how to describe the "hurt" feeling. One thing it seams like is on my arms it hurts for the hair on my arms to be rubbed the wrong way. :confused: That feeling is about what I mean when I say it hurts. Kind of a nerve like pain I guess.

The itching is only on my thighs with tight jeans if my thighs go numb.

The bra thing it's just the back strap (which BTW when I do wear one it has to be way to loss to feel OK for a few hours), it's also the shoulders.

Quote:

Originally Posted by MSacorn (Post 220845) Socks, that's my biggest problem. Especially my right foot. The socks can't be to tight or thin. They spin around my foot, literally, I don't know why. Also it feels like the sock material is caught between my toes, but to look at it, I know it's not. Weird stuff.

I thought I was the only person on earth with this problem! :confused:

It is the same thing happening again; each time I feel I am really having something unique going on someone else has it too! :p

I can't wear sox at all because it feels they are all bunched up when they aren't! I wear hose or...nothin'! :cool:

bras are not my problem, its my tee shirts worn inside out or backwards, can usually tell its on backwards, after to 6th or 7th time i tug at the neck cause its choking me

Glad to hear you're not having a problem with your bra Frank! I remember you saying how much you hate it when that happens!! :icon_lol:

Julie, I get the same thing from time to time (the itching) but it's usually on my back and right in that one little area that you can't reach either from above or below. So annoying!! It usually preceeds a flare up - that's one way I can tell I'm going to have one is my back starts itching in that one little spot.

I've been having this same sensation but only on the right side - the side currently affected by my ongoing flare. Right in the rib cage area sometimes it feels like something is squeezing so tight it might crack a rib! Very painful. I can't even get a good, deep breath when the pain is at it's worst.

Ahhhh.....such fun. :rolleyes:

Dressing is a daily challenge for me. Some days I can wear jeans, others the texture drives me nuts. I cannot wear anything "fitted" as it can sometimes cause spasms.

And shoes, well thats a whole different issue. I can't wear them. I wear flip flops or slippers. I have so many pretty heeled shoes. I miss wearing my wedge sandals. I miss wearing heels. I just can't wear any shoe that encloses my whole foot. Something I truly don't understand but it happens.

I cant stand my hiking shoes. Which I have to wear this winter because we've been having a freakish amount of snow. I have to loosely tie them because I hate having my feet in them.

If there's no snow on the ground and it's dry outside, I've been wearing my summer shoes. Crocs. They shoes made out of a rubbery type of foam. Sooooo comfy! I saw that they make winter Crocs now, they have fake sheepskin inside the Crocs now, I just cant find any here in town that will fit me. All I've seen are childrens winter Crocs. No adult ones.

hmmm...makes me think.

Well, I'm an odd 'fit' anyway. I'm weird about wearing jewelry; drives me nuts to have something around my neck.

Clothing has always been a problem for me. Not so much the feel, but the fit.

I'm short (under 5'4) and now overweight. I used to be very thin. I have a long torso in respect to my short legs. I sound pretty odd don't I:D

This makes clothing hard to find. If it fits my waist and hips it doesn't fit my 'length' and I'm not up to shortening stuff. If it fits the length it's usually tight in the rise.

I don't like bras that squeeze me under the breast area. Hate that feeling; or underwires that dig in (men have it so easy in this regard!).

I must have comfy shoes too. I hate foot pain or slippage.

I can't wear crocs or any of the open heel type shoes....my foot is small and narrow and I'll walk right out of them!

I know this is not MS related. I'm just not the 'typical' size now days.

Tootsie:winky:

Not all Crocs are open heel...the ones I have, have a heel strap. I have to wear my Crocs with the heel strap because I'll also walk out of my shoes.

It was suggested to you that your discomfort was not likely to be MS because it was intermittent- i can see the point of the post but i do not entirely agree. I also noite that someone said that you donot have confirmed MS- so my comments are based more on the concept of neuropathic pain/discomfrt regardless of the underlying cause/ neuro pathic discomfort certainly does not have to be a constant issue to exist- i am an RN plus a person with neuro pain ( my comments are based on both). I have a condition called Reflex sympathetic Dystrophy that leads to severe neuropathic pain, i am an amputee who sufferes phantom pain (also a neuropathic pain syndrome) and i have highly reactive RRMS with numerous neuropathic pain [roblems. The one thing that i know for sure about neuro painis that while it can be constant for some, it can also come and go- i will go for weeks without phantom pain only then to be kept awake for days on end with severe pain ( no rhyme or reason as to what caused it), it will be so severe that it feels i ma being hit with a cattle prod, it makes me yelp in pain. IF you think that this may be a neuro pathic problem ( you do not need MS to have such an issue- RSD is the classic example, it starts after minor injury but leads to extremely disabling symptoms)- talk to your Dr, there are no magic cures but the drugs such as lyrica and neurontin can make a very big difference. On the non drug idea, its is easy to try to avoid touching the area that hurts to avoid pain but ultimately this can make things worse, the area gets more and more sensitive to less stimulation- for example people with severe phantom pain will often minimise the discomfort by a techniqu e called counter irritation- in my case this means that when i get pain in my stump i will sit and continuosly lightly slap the affending area- gradually you no longer feel the pain but feel the slaps instead ( the NS can only transmit the one type of impusle at a time is the theory) some people will use TENS units to provide the counterirritation. Obvioulsy, if may not be a neuro thing, it could be to do with detergents etc- you can test this by eliminations. eg go back to just soap and water rather than powerful detergents, eliminate fabric softener for a while etc etc to see if it helps but also talk to you PCP about the issue, he is probably the best situated to look at the issue from a more global point rather than whether or not it is MS

5Kidz,

I can't STAND t-shirts anymore. I used to sleep in them all the time and had a few favs. But they really, really bother me--especially under the arms anymore. The only thing that I can sleep in (if I sleep in something) is a tank top with wide arm holes. Generally, however, that bothers me too and I end up ripping it off in the middle of the night.

Mom,

What you're describing is what I felt like for a good long time in 2003. I had the burning sensation and I even developed a red mark where my underwear band was that didn't go away for 3 or 4 days one time (and I'm not allergic to anything like fabric softeners, soap, or latex). It happened in the bra area too--where the bottom part goes around your chest. And yes, I hear ya when you talk about the hair being rubbed the wrong way. I could have jumped when the breeze blew the wrong way and went against my skin. Ouchy!!

Hang in there. It sucks.

Neurontin helped me with that kind of stuff. It helped a lot. Of course, I ended up being on about 2400 mg. of it a day before it did too much for me, but I'm off it now and it's all good. :)

One suggestion before I get to the question I'm going to ask. Can you break up the paragraphs some instead of having one huge paragraph? Some people with cog fog end up getting lost in large batches of text. (not trying to offend, just hoping to make things easier for people with the suggestion)

Ok, my question. Have you ever used a tens unit?

My mom is getting one monday (she has some spinal stenosis and some serious neurological pain in my back and legs right now)

Do the tens units always work, or are they only good for some people?

i have tried the tens unit and it doesnt work for me, and i also agree please break up the paragraphs, its very hard to read for a number of us, i do it too

i start typing and it keeps flowing and forget to break the sentences up, plus i dont use much puncuation to help show where my mindless thoughts begin or end.


peace

my apologies about not breaking the paragraphs up- i have been having to use voice recognition software as my hands have been spasming too much when i try to type- i am still getting used to it and did not really consider formatting as i would when i typed the usual way

i will try to make sure i make things clearer in future

I did not mean to imply that MS neuropathic pain can’t be intermittent, because it is for me too. It was the TOTAL picture, as described, that doesn’t add up to a definition of neuropathy to me.

MX7’s clothing issue occurs for only a few days at a time + has been ongoing for many months. It effects her (itchy, tingling) where her clothes are more snug + severe pain is not the primary descriptive.

Is this the way you would describe neuropathic pain . . . because it definitely does not match my experience/definition in any way?

As you implied, there is no rhyme or reason to neuropathy. It most often lasts for several days to weeks, and doesn’t normally repeat in neatly defined areas (as was described by MX7). In your case, as an amputee, it may make sense that at least some of your particular neuropathy (phantom pain) might be more constant (experienced in one distinct area). This area of damage for you is very stable, but that is not normally the case with damage that occurs from our MS.

The most obvious reason that this is not likely to be neuropathy is that the “hurt” feeling was not adequately described or emphasized. We might all have different ways of describing it, but the overriding theme (if our “clothes issue” is from neuropathy), would be the severity of pain and burning sensations.

Even if a person had MS, I would not at all presume that this particular symptom, as described by MX7, is related to the disease. It just doesn’t add up to neuropathy, at least as I know it, and hence should not be ignored as “another symptom that nothing can be done about”. I agree she should mention it and try to find an alternate cause through her GP.

Cherie

That's ok. I've played around with the voice recognition software on my computer (for a school project in a desktop publishing class I took a few years ago) My computer's voice recognition program is kind of touchy...gets kind of aggravating to tell it to do something, and it either does something completely different, or it just sits there because it doesnt understand what I want.

Sometimes I'll type a huge paragraph too, and will forget to break it up before I post it...and then I'll have to edit the message and go back to hit the enter key a few times.

It just takes a little longer to read thru a large block of text sometimes because I'll get lost halfway thru it. End up reading one sentence over and over and cant find the next line for some reason.

If I dont give up like I've done on another forum where there's a person who posts huge blocks of text. Sometimes I'll put the text into my text-to-speech program and have the computer read it to me instead.

I'm never very good at makeing my self clear in a post, It's not that these things come for only a few days over the past few month.

The waist issues only happened a few days in a row (been going on 3 or so years, and has happened maybe a dozen time or so) most of the time and it's never a blotting things. I just can't handle anything at my waste touching my skin.
The itching thing is just my thighs when my legs are numb and than not every time my legs go numb, just if the jeans are snug on my thighs.

What's been going on for months (everyday) is that I can't wear a bra hardly any more. The straps on my shoulders hurt (I'm pretty sure this is the fibro, remember I DO believe I do have fibro, I don't think I was miss-DX on this one - I have most of the tender points at every check up) but the back band gets me too. This just started up a few months before I started having the numbness from that point in my back and down and odd pain in my back.
I have tried wearing the strap really loss and have tried pulling the back of the strap very low on my back and it didn't help, I just can't handle having anything snug across my back right now.

The one thing I always point out to Dr.'s and nurses that want me to "rate my pain" on the scale of 1 to 10, is that my level of pain is so different from most. I tell them I have given birth to 7 children and have made it to 10cm dilated with no meds and still been joking around and laughing at that point.

Julie ... I sent you a PM :D

There is no doubt there is something going on, Julie.

This is not my experience with neuropathic pain though and if it pans out to be MS, you'll unfortunately know what I mean if/when that symptom gets you :( . . . I too have an extremely high tolerance to pain.

Cherie

Wow! Me, too! :eek:

LOL Frank!!! I saw Sienfeld last night on TV. It was the one about the "Bro" or the "Manzier".......LMAO at men who need support!!! YOU are too funny!!!

Cherie
I have experience with neuropathic pain from the perspective of an amputee, i also have a condition called reflex sympathetic dystrophy and i have neuropathic pain in relation to my MS i am also using my experience as an RN when i think about this issue.
The one thing i can tell you is that while there are elements of neuropathic pain that may seem a classic description, there are also a very broad spectrum of other feelings/sensations that are related to neuropathy. Just as MS varies greatly from one person to another but has common threads to the story- my experience of neuropathic pain/sensation is the same- there is a huge spectra of descriptions. Apart from out and out pain, there are altered sensations that can include feelings such as itchiness and feelings heat, tingling etc. or feelings such as ones hand is constantly clenched in a fist no matter what position it really is in!

I guess my thoughts that this was less likely to be an issue with contact to irritants such as detergents is that typically if an indivdual is having problems with contact irritants, they may experience itching, tingling, burning etc but as it these sesations are due to a physical irritation there is usually a physical observable reaction - even if it is only mild redness!- it is relatively easy to eliminate harsh detergents, soaps, perfumes etc to see if things improve though.


As for the questions about whether TENS units work or not. The simple answer is that they do for some individuals with some types of pain but there is no guarentee. For sometypes of pain they work by applying counter irritation. eg, the tingling sensation of the TENS unit is felt instead of the original pain.

The down side is that for some, the constant tingling is just as bad. I have looked after patients who have sworn by TENS units and others who have said they are worse than the pain! TENS units can be rented through Physical threapists at times to test whether they work for you or not. There are also Nerve stimulators that are implanted into the spine that work in a similar way but are definitely more effective when selected to the right client. These are used for some types of neuropathic pain