Strange symptoms

[AMC5]

Just over a year ago I experienced strange symptoms. I am 30 yr old, good health, don't smoke, don't drink.  One morning I started having trouble speaking.  Saying wrong words, couldn't read, could barely dial the phone, forgot phone numbers, wrote down wrong numbers when being told what numbers to dial.  About a half hour before this had visual problems.  It was like everything was jiggling.  Wasn't "dizzy", just everything around me was almost  like bouncing.  Whole visual episode lasted about 20 minutes, trouble thinking, speaking, lasted about 10 minutes.  Couldn't even get the names of my children right.  Was very concerend.  Went to ER, did CT-normal.  Weeks later had MRI  w/o contrast, US of heart, neck, thyroid.  All normal.  Blood work all normal except elevated Thyroid which later when re-checked was normal.  Neurologist thought possible TIA, then changed to possible Atypical Migraine.  No history of Migraines.  Had dull headache when all over.  Since then have had a few visual problems, and some dizzy spells.  Nothing like what happened that day.  Any ideas?  Does this sound more like a type of Migraine?  Thanks for your time.

[Mysterious Stranger]

misaki, would you care to tell us whether you have personally used aspartame in your diet?  Diet soda or other artificially sweetened products?  I'm curious.

[AMC5]

Was not taking any antibiotics and don't use artificial sweetners.

[CHADDY]

It sounds a lot to me like a TIA.  Sometimes, I believe, clinical evaluation is the only way to determine a TIA, because none of the test(to my understanding) will show a sign of a "mini-stroke".  I could be wrong, but this is what I heard from a person that had one.  best wishes.  chad

[southern belle]

At one time nutrasweet contained mannitol..not sure if it still does as this was when it was first introduced when they were weaning saccarin out. At the time I drank diet drinks..they started with a "blend" of saccarin and nutrasweet to get ppl use to it. I noticed when the blend was introduced I had a lot of nausea but thought it was a matter of getting use to. After one week of "blend" started getting headaches. Didnt find out cause of problem till nutrasweet gumballs were placed in a cereal as a "gift" lol. Anyway..I had severe allergic reaction to mannital after surgery once..so that obviously was culprit in my case. Have not used diet products since as all have nutrasweet in them. Keep in mind when reading research that often they can manipulate any results they get to achieve what they wish results to show. They only get future grants for results after all.

[De-De]

I'm one of those who've been diagnosed at "complicated migraine".  I definitely get the stroke-like auras usually without headache (sometimes rather mild, tylenol usually helps).  I've experienced expressive aphasia (unable to speak or say the right words), generally out of it, right sided weakness-tingling-numbness)

I've had the "million dollar" workup - Heart / Brain caths, every blood test in the book, MRI/MRA's, CT's, multiple lumbar punctures.  Everything normal, except for smaller than normal arteriest at the base of the brain.  I understand this is a common finding in migraners.

I've managed these episodes with daily preventative medicines, (aspirin, verapamil, nortriptyline), avoiding trigger foods, and getting sufficient exercise.

Believe me, after 2 years, I still have a hard time accepting this neurological disease.

[misaki]

You don't know me, so you can't talk about my medical education. Which, by the way, is one of the best you can get. Cajal (in case you don't know, he was nobel prize for doing research in neurohistology) was a professor in my medical school, in the same department I am doing neuroanatomy research since age 18. Maybe if you spent all the time I have studying biochem, physiology, pathology, etc., you would see that there's no proof at the moment of aspartame's supposed toxicity, if consumed in the amounts *permitted* by FDA.

>> So, what is aspartame? Aspartame is just a combination of phenylalanine (phe) and aspartic acid (asp). Those are two aminoacids just like the ones that can be found in your body's proteins.

>> Fruit and aspartame doesn't have "methanol". Methanol is made in your body as a result of aminoacids metabolism. And there's NO difference between the methanol that results from natural products and man made products - it's the same compound.

>> You can't consume isolated methanol but you can eat fruit. Why? Because there "isn't" the same amount of methanol in an apple than in a methanol bottle. And you don't have to go to medical school to know that.

>> I don't need to open my text books to know what a methanol intoxication looks like, and I don't find its treatment surprising because i know the mechanisms in which are based. Maybe if you opened my textbooks, and then spent 6 years studying them instead of reading what other people say on internet, you would see my point.

>> I have not yet found a single case in medical literature of some patient that has been cured from MS-like or lupus-like symptoms by quitting diet soda. If you know someone, please refer him to a MEDICAL DOCTOR to do further research.

>> You ask me about myself. Yes, I drink LOTS and LOTS of diet coke. But, alas, my one and only relapse appeared two years before I started taking it. And drinking soda doesn't make me worse, in fact, not drinking diet coke makes me a lot more tired. I'm a caffeine junkie, just like 95% of med students. And none of my neurologists, nor my professors in med school has told me to stop drinking diet coke.

It's well known by physicians worldwide that the aspartame thing on the internet it's nothing but a hoax. There isn't any article in Medline to prove it. But if people prefer to blame aspartame for their illness, instead of searching for a good neurologist and facing the dx, they're in their right.

I won't tell anyone what to believe. I'm only talking about evidence.