Originally Posted by roxygirl577

Hello all, I'm new here and was hoping someone would be able to help me. I'm not sure what I have is TN but maybe someone will recognize my symptoms and be able to steer me in the right direction. Unfortunately I have no insurance and am very poor so I cannot see a doctor for awhile but I am in so much pain and not knowing what's wrong with me is really taking a toll and maybe if I knew where to start or which kind of doctor would be best I can try and see one.

Four years ago I got a total TMJ replacement and had major facial nerve damage. I was never told anything about my trigeminal nerve, just told that I had facial nerve damage. I suffered from a sort of Bell's palsy where I couldn't move the right side of my face, most of that cleared up except for around my eye and eyebrow and around my chin. None of that caused me pain however up until a few months ago. From my surgery I had to start using eye drops because my eye didn't blink all the way, I got a gold implant put in so that solved it but I still used eye drops here and there with no problem. I noticed though that around 8 months ago the drops started causing intense pain in my eye so I though I was having a bad reaction and stopped using them ( I didn't really need them anymore anyways) that seemed to help but then about a month later that same pain started happening at random times, maybe about once a week. Progressively it started getting more frequent and the pain was SO intense, I can describe it as sharp, burning, throbbing, electrical pain in and around my eye. My eye also waters really bad, my nose runs like crazy and my eye starts spasming. It gets really red and swollen and this lasts about 15 minutes. I notice that it happens now almost every time I eat. It seems to be a trigger? Also, drinking anything, even water, wind, cold, sun, and smelling food are also triggers. I get it now about 2-3 times a day and the pain is getting so intense that I have to go somewhere private because it causes me to scream. It's getting worse and I am so terrified the whole day anticipating the next one and so afraid I will get more and more episodes. I've stopped eating and drinking in public, I'm afraid of eating even at home so I limit how much I do and now it's happening at work and I'm afraid of losing my job. Sorry for going on so long but I am hoping someone will recognize my symptoms and let me know if it sounds like TN or maybe something else nerve related, I have no idea what else it could be. I've done research and it sounds like maybe it's a 50/50 chance it is, it's so hard to tell on articles. Thank you so much in advance.