Hello,I'm new here.I'm a 32 year old french men. Sorry for my english, this is my storie:-july 2011, i have new job,new beautiful baby-august 2011, i bought a new house and work on it everyday until february 2012-end of december, i have had anxiety attack which go away in january.-mid february, i new have very high anxiety-march, i have loose a 4 friends who have cancers. I have seen my oncle at the end of his life (horrible) and fasciculations began in my calvesThen i have use dr Google and the fasciculations went all in my body. I have had EMGs and clinical exams in may and end of july which were normal.Since June, I have pains and tingling in my hands and forearms.I'm very very depressed and very anxious. My life is a nightmare and I think to go out my family because i would'nt that my 2 young childs not seen theire father to go away with this terrible disease.I'm sure,A** is in my bodyThanks,Arnaud
New Here - Anxiety and Loss
- Thread starter Sabina7
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Absolutely everything you say point to the fact that you have BFS, especially this:1. Anxiety filled events in your life before twitching started. Classic BFS. In fact, most of us have anxiety issues in general, and it sounds like you do too.2. Clean EMGs. Basically, you can't ask for anything better than that to rule out the disease you're afraid of.Just like Johnny said -- I couldn't be more sure that you're healthy and just dealing with what we're all dealing with: benign twitching. It can be hard to get your mind around, that twitching like this could be benign, but it is.The best thing you can do for yourself now is try to deal the best with your anxiety.Mitra
christinasgirl123
Well-known member
Arnaud, your symptoms could not be more typical BFS. For me at this point, there's not soi much more to say but: You are fine. If you were here now I could look you straight into your face and tell U: I am convinced there's nothing else going on in your body but good old BFS. And the faster you start to BELIEVE this, the sooner you will feel better.
hello Aranud,no, you do not have ALS but what you have is definitely severe stress. Four deaths in a row, heavy personal experiences, little children... your body just reacts to the severe stress and this is very very typical reaction.I got my own BFS after one year of exhausting work and resulted critical feedback because I was wirking far beyond any reasonable amounts...having such stress is a bit like have a bite from vampire 
in a horror story - first you are just fine, but gradually you get worse and boom! - you are a vampire (or having BFS or other anxiety realted disease).as you would survive your hard times (better with kind support of the rest of the family), you would feel better for sure.welcome on board, read the forum and you will meet a lot of fellow twitcher with a similar symptomes living in that for years. We have many stories of recovery here too.Do not quit the family - no one can support you as your wife and children, to be honest (if they are generally supportive, of course). I was in your shoes just 6-7 month ago when I told to my daughter and husband that I might be dying from ALS. I told to my daughter that she should not quit her dream to go abroad for education, and I asked my husband if he would stay with me. He was really upset with the fact that I am taking stress for deadly disease but still he saud yes, I would be with you.so in more than 6 month I am still fine and the only regret is that I made them suffer at least several days or hours thining their mom is a bit crazy...Stress is a condition which nobody should take for nothing special. Go and treat your anxiety, find a friend, a doctor, look for people here - and you would be OK, I am absolutely sure.hugsYulia
in a horror story - first you are just fine, but gradually you get worse and boom! - you are a vampire (or having BFS or other anxiety realted disease).as you would survive your hard times (better with kind support of the rest of the family), you would feel better for sure.welcome on board, read the forum and you will meet a lot of fellow twitcher with a similar symptomes living in that for years. We have many stories of recovery here too.Do not quit the family - no one can support you as your wife and children, to be honest (if they are generally supportive, of course). I was in your shoes just 6-7 month ago when I told to my daughter and husband that I might be dying from ALS. I told to my daughter that she should not quit her dream to go abroad for education, and I asked my husband if he would stay with me. He was really upset with the fact that I am taking stress for deadly disease but still he saud yes, I would be with you.so in more than 6 month I am still fine and the only regret is that I made them suffer at least several days or hours thining their mom is a bit crazy...Stress is a condition which nobody should take for nothing special. Go and treat your anxiety, find a friend, a doctor, look for people here - and you would be OK, I am absolutely sure.hugsYuliathanks all,I'm very bad. I do nothing, just work in my job. I'm sure...the disease progresschristinasgirl123 i don't understand "your symptoms could not be more typical BFS" . I 'm not like the other bfs member ?I have read a lots and lots forum and my fasciculations are not anonym...Regards,
it is up to you, Arnaud, to hope or not, nobody can give you more hope or reassurance than you can accept, and it seems to me that you do not accept any for yourself, it is so sad...But how do you know that you are deadly ill?You FEEl ill, it is true. But your clinical exams are Ok, your EMG is clean, and you did not write anything about clinical weakness (inability to use your muscles). you know, something like "I can not take a key to close the door" or "I can not move a hand or a leg" - like that, not like "I have pain and fascics in my hand/leg".All what you told us is typical for high anxiety and related BFS (including solid belief that you are deadly ill, too).You said you had panick attack and severe anxiety flareups recently. May I ask what was the treatment? Do you have any idea that single panick attack might have a consequences lasting for 3-4 month after? That it need be treated, even single one? Do you know that people who lost their friends and relatives need professional help from psychologist?There is really a help for you and from your desperate tone I feel that you need it the sooner the better. Obsessive anxiety and acute grief seldom kill - but your life might be really destroyed. I would encourage you to ask professional help from psychologyst or pshychiatris, whatever you'd like.
SSRI is a long term course and in first 2-4 weeks it makes everything really bad - mood, twitchng etc.also there are different SSRI's as well as different kinds of antistress drugs - maybe your problem is not the lack of serotonine or dophamine, and you might need other meds/ like tricyclic antidepressants or even benzos... it is a bit of art to choose right medication.Anyway, in your condition you need both medication and speaking therapy - this is my own experience and many people here can tell you the same. I have so strong sympathy to you, Arnaud. Because I was where you are now - only 8 month ago.My therapist, this site and medication made a miracle. I can write, I can walk, play with my dog, do my daily works (a lot of!), write stories... 8 month ago I thought my life is really terminated. But I managed to survive. Many of us here did it. So it is your choise finally whether try and win your life or give up. Nobody really knows how hard you suffer, but we can only give yu a support and reassurance - that is why this site was created - to educate and support people like you and me.
I'm still worried but I will try to work on my anxiety.It's very hard for me...I'm afraid to loose my family to this disease. I couldn't accept the responses of the neuro, i don't why i have this in my forarms and hand, this is a slowly progress of the disease.help me please
Arnaud, I would gladly help you if my own experience can help.First of all, please read a post called BFS in a nutshell. It is sticky post in ome of the forum threads. It is a compilation of mailing which our moderator Garym had with ALS specialist, in which the doctor explained that neither twitches, nor pain do not mean MND without clinical weakness. And it contains many useful knowledge about EMG, perceived weakness etc.There are also several posts here in which our fellow colleagues share their experience of closest relatives dying from ALS. ALS progressing never looks like having pains and twitches anywhere. One guy told that his father first can not pick up fishing hook (loss of fine motorics). In a few weeks his dad was not able to turn a car key because not only fingers were dead, but the whole palm muscles. and only after whole his hand was paralysed, the twitches began, but he was not able to feel them. Another fellows says his dad was playing golf and just can not hold the golf pole - suddently and completely he lost his arm muscles. In a few month he was in a hospise on ventialtor. I had read our russian ALS boards (I am from the former USSR), and the stories were the same - suddenly could not move scissors, suddenly can not pick up the shovel, suddenly started to fall down because one leg was dead...That is how ALS is working. Sudden loss of muskle activity, constant and progressive without any comebacks.You did not state nothing like this. Instead you say about anxiety and fear and grief. This, along with recent good exams and good EMG rules ALS out completely.The truth is again that you FEEL dying, you are scared and your life quality is awful.it is common for some of us to distrust neuros when they say we are OK.Usually it means that we need that fear for some reason. Believe me, I suffer GAD (generlized anxiety disorder) since I was 6, and now I am 42, and I know from my own experience that your age is about that one when anxiety disorders start to takeover and has to be defeated if quality of your life and life of your children is important for you.So, coming back to fear and why we need it. Sound strange. But for some of us being deadly feared is the only refuge in the hard life, or it is the way to say - here I am so lonely in my fears, help me, or it is the way to receive any other benefit. ususally very important, but not accesible in other ways. or it is just fear, and because fears are used to make a vitious cirles, you are just trapped in one of them.good psychologist (not phsychiatrist, because they deal with more rough troubles) should help you through talking about your losses and fears to understand why it is so important to you to believe you are dying. For me it was important for example because I also believed that I broke my family rules and must be punished therefore. You might have your own deep reasons, and finding it would help a lot. Finally, as person loosing few friends in a row (suppose they also were not too old!), being a witness of your uncle death, having two little childern (sleep deprivation and paternal fears can crush anybody!!!!) and working for an own house you just NEED (I can not type it in a more caps, however I wish I could) YOU NEED speaking theraly, it is absolutely prescribed!!!I was in your shoes, as I told you. I had got BFS along with ALS fears last october after one year of exhausting work and some stress. I was sure I am dying. I had 24/7 twithces, cramps in my legs, I had numb arms, swallowing problems, I had even grip problems (later it appeared that they are caused by specific cold-related muscle weakness developed in me because I suffer also from Ellers Danloss syndrome, and hand warming helps a lot).right now I have fascial (jaw) twitches and even spasms, today I had got lower throat front muscle twitch, my hands are still aching (because I type for 12 hours in a day - I am a freelance translator, and to earn plain european salary I need to work as a slave), I have *beep* bad neck circulation causing tingling in hands and legs, ny hands are numb every morning - but I am not dying from ALS, I just have BFS and I had not good rest for last three month, that is why I have a flareup.I also have all that circus in a throat - girggling sound, ball feeling, sometimes choking, dry swallowing, husky voice - because I suffer from GERD and it causes all that stuff (along with bad coughing after meals and awful pians in the chest sometimes). I must quit tomatoes, but I can not, alas! I love them too much!I still have crapms too - I think, it is for 5 years or so - and few years ago they were so strong that I can not make love with my husband without having a cramp! it is all wane now.Arnaud, you need a speaking therapist to whom you may trust. I was for 4 years in speaking therapy before BFS, because literally at the age of 36-37 i was DYING from the anxiety disease, my career was running down, etc. etc. I managed to get it all back in a new freelance job, I found a new life and then - boom - too much of life and work - and BFS!!! And after BFS onset my therapist helped me a lot. I also was taking rexetine, vitamine B mix and was keeping strict day schedule with minor stretching excercises. In 4 month I was OK. I consider myself OK even now woth all that flareup.Take a break.Go and find good therapist of whatever discipline (there are many of them and some are even free - call to personal crisis center in your region, and they would provide you with initial information).Your symptomes, as you describe them, do not match ALS but they match a REAL DISEASE - OAD, Obsessive Anxiety Disorder, which has to be treated and could be treated successfully.Do not give up to that internal vampire!hugsYulia
nope, tingling (sensory symptome, like pins and needles - is that you feel?) is even less indicative of ALS than anything else. Shoudl your muscles die, you woudl not able to use them and you would notice that, and your doctors - on the clinical exams. It is loss of strength, and not percieved.What happened to you is very common. run through this site, you would find many people with that symptome.what kind of job do you doing? if it is related to working with PC, and if you had to use your hands for more than 6 hours per day, then you have just mild irritation of nerves, it is even not an ulnar syndrome, but syndrome-like condition, very very common for us. If your work as a worker (carpenter, building worker, etc.) - it is even more likely tiredness...If you had spinal taps (punctions) and your liquor is Ok, then you might exclude any infection like encefalitis etc. remember, anxiety and sterss do not make changes which ciould be found in your blood , liquor, on on MTR/CT/EMG.
nope, tingling (sensory symptome, like pins and needles - is that you feel?) is even less indicative of ALS than anything else. yes thisI work on my PC 8hour per day + search ALS informations in my home PC 2 hours per day.I have had bloodwork last week and i m waiting results. The only fact is positiv is that during my holidays my fasciculations decrease but infortunatelly not my tingling 
tingling is common in BFS. But often it is a separate symptome caused by neck circulation problems. I had it about 3-4 years ago in my right hadn - holy God, it was lasting for months... and my leg was swollen and a hand was tingling all day... awful thing.It waned completely in the neuro office )) but i was taking circulation improving drugs for 2 or 3 month then and since that I never had it so severe, however now I can easily provoke tingling and twitches by just putting my hand on the edge of my table 
((
)) but i was taking circulation improving drugs for 2 or 3 month then and since that I never had it so severe, however now I can easily provoke tingling and twitches by just putting my hand on the edge of my table ((Arnaud, on my experience - absolutely normal. I mean if you were in fascics for 6 month and have 2 clean EMG - you are fine then. EMG is very sensitive and usually clinical signs are not missed, the only issue might be how they may be interpreted.For example, I had EMG after 2 month of fascis because my neuro considered that I need it. I had no fascics during EMG but i had some fine regular firings which the doctor was studing for long time causing me a hell of pain by the way 
)) What are you doing - screamed I, and he said - I have to rule out malignant fasciculations. finally he managed to obtain enough data to calculate some indices and released me with a note: no sing of motor neuron damage. After that EMG I got a bunch of symptomes like percievied weakness, loss of grip due to touching cold metal surfaces, pain in thumbs, numb hands/legs, etc. but I am still fine - walking, working 12 hours a day, etc. no clinical weakness - no MND. period.I wonder how "many people were diagnosed with widespread fasciculations" because all what I know about ALS is that diagnosis is made not on the basis of fasciculations, but on the basis of clinical findings like: hyperreflexia together with weak paralysis (palsy), specific chanes in neuro conductivity seen on EMG, failure to pass clinical exams etc.Fascicualtions itself never could be a differential sign to diagnoze ALS. Just because they are caused by so many reasons - by stress No1, then by lack of Ca-Mg (ask people who use prilosec for years due to GERD - they often twitch as a hell!), by hormonal changes (thyroid, some pituitary gland hormones), by high bilirubine (so called Gilbert syndrome, many of our fellow twitchers have it), by Ellers Danloss syndrome (wich is in 1 person of every 10 thousands - qute frequent, many of us here also have it to a different degree), etc. etc.Fascics are not specific. While combination of hyperreflexia and palsy (due to involvement of both brain and lower motor neurones), clinical weakness, etc. are specific and characterisitc for ALS. you must have those signs, not fascis, to be diagnosed with ALS.Please remember that BFS is also progressing or rather changes from one symptom to another, sometines rapidly adding new location, new sensations, new types of twitch. But that is normal for BFS. While ALS has no diversity - it is quite rapid loss of muslce power up to inability to use single finger, single part of limb, the wole side of the body, the second half of the body etc. It never jumps like BFS - today here, then there.well. go here, read different information on fasciculations, I hope that would help a bit:
)) What are you doing - screamed I, and he said - I have to rule out malignant fasciculations. finally he managed to obtain enough data to calculate some indices and released me with a note: no sing of motor neuron damage. After that EMG I got a bunch of symptomes like percievied weakness, loss of grip due to touching cold metal surfaces, pain in thumbs, numb hands/legs, etc. but I am still fine - walking, working 12 hours a day, etc. no clinical weakness - no MND. period.I wonder how "many people were diagnosed with widespread fasciculations" because all what I know about ALS is that diagnosis is made not on the basis of fasciculations, but on the basis of clinical findings like: hyperreflexia together with weak paralysis (palsy), specific chanes in neuro conductivity seen on EMG, failure to pass clinical exams etc.Fascicualtions itself never could be a differential sign to diagnoze ALS. Just because they are caused by so many reasons - by stress No1, then by lack of Ca-Mg (ask people who use prilosec for years due to GERD - they often twitch as a hell!), by hormonal changes (thyroid, some pituitary gland hormones), by high bilirubine (so called Gilbert syndrome, many of our fellow twitchers have it), by Ellers Danloss syndrome (wich is in 1 person of every 10 thousands - qute frequent, many of us here also have it to a different degree), etc. etc.Fascics are not specific. While combination of hyperreflexia and palsy (due to involvement of both brain and lower motor neurones), clinical weakness, etc. are specific and characterisitc for ALS. you must have those signs, not fascis, to be diagnosed with ALS.Please remember that BFS is also progressing or rather changes from one symptom to another, sometines rapidly adding new location, new sensations, new types of twitch. But that is normal for BFS. While ALS has no diversity - it is quite rapid loss of muslce power up to inability to use single finger, single part of limb, the wole side of the body, the second half of the body etc. It never jumps like BFS - today here, then there.well. go here, read different information on fasciculations, I hope that would help a bit:christinasgirl123
Well-known member
Yes, read "BFS in a nutshell" and" why you don't have ALS" by the oldtimers. You will find all answers there.