Welcome to the Forum - BFS Sufferer

[TxOldCarGuy]

New guy here, age 47, father of 1 teenager, married 21 years, electrical engineer by day, car restorer by.... well, whenever I get a chance. I have had various bouts with BFS on and off for years, though never knew it had a name or was an accepted diagnosis until recently. Just been dealing with a lengthy bout lasting from January, still going on a bit. Gotta say, my symptoms (and stress) fell through the floor when I started reading this site a week ago and EVERY one of my symptoms shows up here! Its all well and good for the neurologist to say, "I'd tell you if you had a serious problem," its another altogether to hear other people say that sometimes their foot buzzes like there's a cell phone on vibrate in there. I thought I was from Mars for a while. For that, I say thank you!Now for the correlations- I've spent about a week reading this site and I know that most of you (and myself) can't really correlate worsening of our twitches, buzzes, and aches with very much. Here are my two very weak correlations:1) Both of my longer bouts of twitchin' started after a course of a newer-generation NSAID for back pain. First time 10 years ago was Celebrex, back in January it was Naproxen and then Diclofenac Sodium for a herniated disk in my neck. Coincidence? Maybe. Stress from the fact that I was already in 24-hour pain? Probably. But it makes me pretty leary of COX-II inhibitor type NSAIDS. So me and Ibuprofen are good friends... no issues with it.2) I've got moderate essential tremor (shaky hands) which I've had since I was 15, if not longer. Doesn't bother me, except to annoy the heck out of me when I drop a screw for the 4th time trying to reassemble a carburetor. I had one old neurologist- long ago retired- comment that he thought some people's "volume control" was just set too high and resulted in feedback like the twitches and tremor, so he wanted to tweak mine down and gave me short course of Klonopin, which worked very well and I think mentally "kicked me out" of the state of worry I'd been in at that time. It didn't really help the tremor, but it sure helped the twitches.And one odd thing that's different from most people here, exercise seems to reduce my twitches, although it does briefly increase the "buzz" sensations. I should say that I don't do super strenuous stuff these days- just walking and hiking mainly. Climbed up and down Guadalupe Peak (8 mile round trip, 3000 feet up and back down) in 12 hours last summer, felt fine the next day. In fact, some of the best I've ever felt is after long hiking in *HOT* ( as in close to or slightly over 100F) weather. Cold (below 60- Texas cold, not Minnesota cold) makes me feel worse with each passing year, but when the mercury crosses 90 in the spring I start doing much better.

 

[GlitterFountain]

Tex,Take a look at the myoclonus discussion board at wemove.orgThere is a guy on there named Buzz who talks about the feedback theory all the time. Your old neurologist sounds like he knew his stuff! Welcome to the forum.

 

[BramTyBram]

Tex,i can definately relate to the exercise issue. when i lift weights steady for 3-4 times a week, my symptoms go into a mild remission. my calves and feet still are 24/7 but the zips and zaps at random in other places become far less. I stopped going to the gym about 4 weeks ago because of spring break and work and since then my twitching has gone nuts. I had a thumper going in the back of my shoulder that lasted 15 hours that would move a shirt and coat it was so strong. Today my right tricep is like a pulse beating and it is making my forearm fatiqued. If you look at some of my old post, i have had all the buzzing crap as well, i had a toe that buzzed for a month, then it moved to my lip and it felt like i had something in the corner of my mouth for weeks. Both of those are gone and i haven't had any of that for quite a while. I had to reply to this because i always like seeing someone with similar issues and my age, i feel like i am old on this site being in my 40's. in two weeks i hit the one year mark of when i noticed all this, i am pretty sure i have had it to some extent for a lot longer, it just nevered bothered me before. i have looked for answers for quite a while but i won't kid you, i think it is what it is and we will never really know what the root cause is. I know a lot of people take offense to this statement on the site but in the big scheme of things we are all pretty fortunate that we got what we got, it could be a lot worse.Good luck and keep making those cars comeback to life, i am a huge old Chevelle fan, 68-72. Hope to have one someday.BW

 

[JohnnyRocket]

For me, exercise increases twitching and sensations only immediately following but I believe overall it reduces my twitching. Some of my exercises tend to be on the more strenuous side, though. If I limited to walking and hiking then I don't expect to have much of an increase at all. I think exercise is one of the most important treatments for BFS. Some people are afraid of it because it can increase twitching, but the overall benefit from stress reduction and total increase in health is very significant.