Undiagnosed 10 years of suffering

There's a lot to read but its all important... Please help me.

I'm 21, female. I eat right. I don't do drugs and I drank a total of two weeks after my birthday to get an idea of what everyone's talking about.

Since I was 10 I've been having health issues. I was diagnosed with IBS and a blood sugar problem we'll call Hypoglycemia. Since I was 10 I've been having daily to weekly occurrences of icy cold hands with what feels like to me is a fever at the same time. Along with this I constantly have issues with temperature and get cold all the time. The other thing is that I get this sudden sharp pain almost always starting in my right forearm that then travels throughout my body. This pain feels similar to growing pains and can last a few minutes or hours. I have yet to discover the source of this pain. Also since I was 10 I get a slow drain of energy or an out of no where sudden draining of energy where I turn pale and feel weak. This you might say is my hypoglycemia but I have recently started to think that this might not be the correct diagnoses.


Why do I think this? Because I eat healthy, eating meals doesn't always make me feel better, the doctor was unimpressed with my glucose tolerance test told me to just eat snacks throughout the day but at the time I could barely walk or function. Also 4 months ago I went to the emergency room because I couldn't level out after two days of hell. They did nothing for me but told me to see my doctor. The unstable event lasted a whole week that's 5 days after going to the ER. At my doctor I was told to go on a carefully watched diet of low glycemic index/complex carbohydrates. I followed it perfectly and it was the worst two months (medically) of my life. The whole time I was nauseous, weak, confused ext ext pretty much all the typical symptoms of hypoglycemia but I was on the perfect diet to fix my hypoglycemic issues.

During those two months I started to hate food and my life. The inability to function took me away from everything and the only thing I could do was just lay there watching T.V. hating every minute of every day. I started drinking soda again after 8 years to try to give a quick sugar rush. I also started eating more desserts and hard candies which I also hadn't eaten in 8 years. Putting sugar back into my diet brought me back to where I had been before. Not that I hadn't eaten sugary foods in 8 years I just hadn't had soda, hard candy or fast food.

The problem is, is that things have gotten much worse since my car crash a year ago on May 17-08. I have back spasms now and constant fatigue with full body pain. It wasn't until that doctors visit 4 months ago that I got something for the pain. (I don't like taking pills) About 1 month ago I started working out and walking my dogs everyday. I needed structure in my day and thought that exercise would help the back pain. This I couldn't do without my Tramadol. It doesn't make me feel normal it just alleviates enough tension/pain that I can do more. My pain scale is at a 7 without the pills and at about a 5 with them. I'm also supposed to be on muscle relaxers but they make me too sleepy during the day and the effect last too long into midday hours if taken at night. I started up a diet journal about a week ago to see if I could track my symptoms and watch to see if certain foods triggered symptoms. Since then I discovered another alarming symptom which I only experience when sleeping. I never paid attention to it because I was sleeping. At night I wake up with parts or the entire right side of my body (not enough time to get a full spectrum of areas) feeling very heavy, numb and it tingles. Similar to if you slept on your arm wrong and cut off the circulation. But that's not possible with an entire side of your body going from head to toe. This new symptom scares me because my back issues are almost entirely on my right side and spine.

Today is the 1st of June I haven't had my Tramadol since the 25th thanks to a mess up with the doctors. I haven't been able to exercise and might have injured myself more trying to keep my routine. Not having it has made my days full of pain and stiffness. My sleep was already horrible with it and its now almost nonexistent without it. Throw in stress, constant lifetime headaches that envelops my whole head and neck. Plus frequent urination up to 15 times a day. The urination issues I've always had. Put all together and this is by far the worst I've ever been.

I can't work. I quit college because of these things and have left the house a total of (I'm rounding here) maybe 20 hours in the last 4 months.

Please help
 
You have quite a few symptoms, not so simple. Have you had blood tests recently?
if not, you should. You should probably have complete bloodwork, make sure to get your iron profile done, and to have your thyroid checked. I would also suggest you see a neurologist. Hope you get answers.
 
I totally agree with the previous post. Ask to get your thyroid level checked. It's a very common blood test, and you don't even have to fast before it. My thyroid problem was diagnosed this way. It showed I had a hypothyroid problem (Hashimoto's Disease) body wasn't producing enough thyroid hormone, and I had felt the fatigue the most. You would feel a lot better once on medicine. I started with a low dose 25mcg, and now it has been slowly adjusted up to 1.75mcg, if this is your problem. I have recently been diagnosed with Multiple Sclerosis (MS), and I've had so many of your symptoms at different times, and again fatigue being the big one. It wouldn't surprise me if you too had both of these problems. I would suggest you see a neurologist too, if it's not a thyroid problem. The neurologist can order an MRI of the brain and neck area, and that may show lesions that may indicate MS, that's how I was diagnosed. I have heard so many stories of people with MS not being diagnosed for years before their MS diagnosis, and you really sound like one of them. I hope you get some diagnosis soon. You need to start living, and seeing the beautiful blue sky more often. :wave
 
Thank you for reading my post. I am grateful that a few people have responded out of the many postings I made. I'm on the verge of giving up on doctors. My newest doctor listened to me for over an hour and thought I had a Thyroid condition. My results came back and nothing. I told the lady on the phone that I needed more tests then, because I need an answer. They sent me a bill that has 5 different lines on it that mean nothing to me. This bill arrived May 16th 2009. They never called again so I'm assuming everything came back negative. The items listed on my bill are...

Anachoice (TM) screen
CBC, PLT, DIFF
Hemoglobin Glycosylated
Comprehen Metabolic Panel
TSH

I went to this new doctor because she works with low income house holds but I won't be going back because her one visit plus this bill from the diagnostic center totals more than 5 other doctors visits combined at my normal doctor.

Thanks Quezya
 
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