Diego4Life
Well-known member
As the swallowing thing keeps coming up, I will give you my view on what I suspect is happening to many of us with BFS and is really the most likely explanation.
Cricopharyngeal spasm
This is caused by spasm of the cricopharyngeus muscle; The esophagus has two valves. When we swallow they relax. Once the food has past through, the valves contract again to prevent reflux of stomach contents.
What can happen is the valve can go into a spasm causing a feeling of a lump in the throat, difficulty swallowing, throat tighness, some people describe that the feel like they have a golf ball in their throat.
The condition is self limiting and usually goes away on its own. It can last from a few days to a few months. The most common cause of this condition is STRESS and ANXIETY.
The kind of swallowing problems associated with serious neurological diseases are not like this. I am not going to describe them because people will start imaging they have them!
Matt, you have seen a neuro, you have had a normal EMG and exam. The one thing all the neuros agree on and all the studies back up is that if you have a normal EMG then you cannot have ALS.
The symptoms you describe sound unpleasent and somewhat familiar to a lot of us. The one thing you can take from this forum is that you can have some really awful neurological symptoms and they do not have to be an indication of anything serious. I have had horrible symptoms for 10 years.
It does sound to me like anxiety is a major factor in your life and this could be causing some or even all of your symptoms. The affects of stress on our bodies lasts months after the stressor has bee eliminated. For example my university did a study into the affects of stress on the immune system. Without going into loads of boring data, they concluded that once the stressor was removed from a person's life, the affects on the immune system continued for a minimum of 8 weeks!
What I'm saying is that even though you have been told that you do not have a serious disease, the affects from worrying about it are still affecting your body and will continue to do so for some time. This is why when people are given the all clear, they still feel awful and symptoms will continue feeding their anxiety more because they think the doctors have missed something!
You may also have back problems? Have you seen a chiropractor? Leg weakness can be caused by nerve root compression, especially if there are some sensory symptoms as well.
Cricopharyngeal spasm
This is caused by spasm of the cricopharyngeus muscle; The esophagus has two valves. When we swallow they relax. Once the food has past through, the valves contract again to prevent reflux of stomach contents.
What can happen is the valve can go into a spasm causing a feeling of a lump in the throat, difficulty swallowing, throat tighness, some people describe that the feel like they have a golf ball in their throat.
The condition is self limiting and usually goes away on its own. It can last from a few days to a few months. The most common cause of this condition is STRESS and ANXIETY.
The kind of swallowing problems associated with serious neurological diseases are not like this. I am not going to describe them because people will start imaging they have them!
Matt, you have seen a neuro, you have had a normal EMG and exam. The one thing all the neuros agree on and all the studies back up is that if you have a normal EMG then you cannot have ALS.
The symptoms you describe sound unpleasent and somewhat familiar to a lot of us. The one thing you can take from this forum is that you can have some really awful neurological symptoms and they do not have to be an indication of anything serious. I have had horrible symptoms for 10 years.
It does sound to me like anxiety is a major factor in your life and this could be causing some or even all of your symptoms. The affects of stress on our bodies lasts months after the stressor has bee eliminated. For example my university did a study into the affects of stress on the immune system. Without going into loads of boring data, they concluded that once the stressor was removed from a person's life, the affects on the immune system continued for a minimum of 8 weeks!
What I'm saying is that even though you have been told that you do not have a serious disease, the affects from worrying about it are still affecting your body and will continue to do so for some time. This is why when people are given the all clear, they still feel awful and symptoms will continue feeding their anxiety more because they think the doctors have missed something!
You may also have back problems? Have you seen a chiropractor? Leg weakness can be caused by nerve root compression, especially if there are some sensory symptoms as well.