Jake,
Please don't be upset, i know i personally find it hard to understand why a lot of people are very sensitive about their mental health and react as if they are being disrespected when mentioned as an alternative explanation.
Mental health truly is a legitimate alternative medical condition for you and many other people to consider, i promise I didn't bring it up to annoy, patronize or be unhelpful, it's not in my nature to do that to anybody, so i am sorry you feel that way...
Please note i specifically highlighted 'IF' and mentioned some of the googling behavioural patterns associated with health anxiety. I consciously chose 'not' to make any assumptions about you, basically leaving it up to you to think about and seriously consider 'IF' mental health conditions like health anxiety was a possibility and mentioned other alternative thoughts as well.
Even people diagnosed with MS can experience anxiety and depression, and i'm always talking to people in diagnostic limbo or diagnose with MS about being proactive with their mental health, simply because everything is so much harder to deal with when you don't!
Peace and i wish you good health...........JJ
Most people don't casually use exacerbation, flare, motor skills, etc., in normal conversation. You said you typed up your symptoms and the result seemed similar to those of MS. You didn't mention knowing much if anything about MS previously. Ergo--
However, that's really immaterial. You totally dodged the issue of allowing the possibility of a psychological cause. If you only knew how many young men have posted here with essentially the same story. There have been loads and loads, so it's unsurprising that we recognize this. Not saying that young men never get MS, am saying that what you describe is very familiar. And not one in this category has come back to say that MS (or any other major neuro issue) has turned out to be the answer.
In any case, I'm finished here. It's up to you what you do with the info offered. As I said, you're the one suffering.
It hasn't been suggested that you would consciously or otherwise cause the symptoms you describe. No one would do that. If that's what has happened, it most likely would be just a bad course of brain chemicals, which could happen to anyone for a lot of reasons. No need to be defensive since there has been no attack, and meanwhile you suffer. If you have a therapist, have you discussed this possibility with him or her?
Also, unless you do a huge amount of general reading on neurological diseases, how would you be so familiar with the terminology of MS? This does not compute, but that's okay. We are not trying to trip you up--we are just responding to your post on an MS forum. I think that you will be much happier if you leave this possibility on the table and proceed with an open mind. Obviously that's up to you. You're the one living in this awful reality.
ess
Yes, every issue mentioned here, without exception, can be caused by anxiety. If there's even one other condition that can be said of, I haven't heard of it.
Jake, please stop googling your symptoms. That hasn't helped, and I think it's made things worse.
Hi and welcome,
I don't have much to add to what ess has already mentioned.......to be totally honest, you use common RRMS relapse terms exacerbation, Attacks, Flare-ups, actually your overall style of writing in my experience is very suggestive of someone who's dealing with high levels of health related anxiety.
'IF' you'd been extensively researching your original symptoms, and then after you started reading about MS, the more symptoms you'd been reading about you started experiencing and the more focused on MS your anxiety became, then i would recommend you seriously consider mental health conditions like health anxiety etc as alternative explanations.
You genuinely have far too many unrelated or all over symptoms, developing in too short a time frame, coming and going during the day, perception of weakness without weakness, perception of heavy, being off, odd sensations etc but still have all your motor skills, your balance is fine and you can still function. Additionally your neurological clinical signs and MS related test results are all perfectly normal etc that the totality of what you have mentioned in general would 'not' be consistent with a neurological condition like MS.
My thoughts...to recommend getting an assessment for the mental health side of things, and you might also want to look into your weight issues, as pre-diabetes, sleep apnea, peripheral neurophathy, hypo and hyper glycemia etc may be involved in what your experiencing too.
Good luck.......JJ
We are not doctors here, so cannot say with any certainty what is happening with your health. We can, though, provide some thoughts from the MS perspective, since you've posted on an MS forum.
Nothing you write strikes me as pointers towards MS. The flares you speak of, coming and going sometimes throughout the same day, are not MS-type flares, which last at least a day or two, but much more often it's weeks or even months of the same specific symptom, localized to the same area. That's because attacks of MS are caused by specific lesions in the central nervous system (brain, neck, spinal cord). If and when the lesions begin to heal (imperfectly), the specific symptoms they cause will begin to ease up. Nothing 'all over' is caused by MS.
The only case in which MS can cause severe nausea and vomiting is where there's been a disruption in the inner ear/balance system and some type of vertigo results. (There are a number of kinds.) An ENT doctor can test for abnormalities in this function with good accuracy, so if you've had this testing and the results were good, look elsewhere for the cause of your symptom. Nausea/vomiting without a balance problem will almost never be from MS.
In all candor, I must say you also have way too many symptoms, most of them rather non-specific, for MS. It seems you get all-over feelings of being unwell that come and go, but you wake up each morning feeling well. Then you think about the issues you mention and they come on again. Your muscle strength and physical performance are quite normal, and all your testing is normal as well.
Perhaps you see where I'm leading with this--the possibility that there's an emotional cause for what's going on. In your shoes I'd find a good psychologist and ask for a thorough evaluation. You are a young male in the prime of your life, and should be active and engaged with life and living. You've undergone a great deal of medical testing over many months without getting answers, so now look into the psychological aspects of your issues. I'm sure your goal is to be well and happy, and this is an avenue worth exploring.
Good luck to you.
ess