Tuesday, January 26, 2010

The mysteries of MS - 2

Do you remember that I wrote about how the cold weather seemed to affect my MS?

Well for the last few days I've been feeling worse. The feeling of heavy legs turned into an intermittent very painful stiffness down the side of my right leg. I could feel the knots of tension in the muscle.

I suffered for a few days before deciding what to do. A long hot bath seems to temporarily ease the pain, so the cold weather seemed to be a logical guess for the cause. I'm now wearing two pairs of socks to try and keep my feet and lower legs warm and increasing the heat at home. By this morning the pain seemed to have moved from my knee area to my ankle and at the moment it seems to have gone altogether.

The only other time I've had such severe spasmodic pain was last summer, during my first big relapse. So I'm left wondering if I'm in the throes of another relapse, if there is more to come? Or did I just physically overdo it during a very busy week last week?

Either way I took a couple of days off writing and editing and have just had a very gentle return to the novel today.

4 comments:

Anne Brooke said...

So sorry to hear things aren't great at the moment, Cathy - please take good care of yourself and hope things improve soon ...

Axxxxx

Anonymous said...

Gosh, doesn't sound great does it. It's been very cold recently, absolutely freezing today up here. Get yourself to the doctor and see if there's anything else they can do. Would massages help at all?

Take care, CJ xx

Sue said...

When my leg tends to go into spasm from the knee to the ankle I've found that a wheat bag, heated for just a minute or so in the microwave, offers some relief - even if only temporarily. It might be worth a try?

The nagging worry that this or that symptom might signal another flare is stressful in itself.I hope things improve soon. xx

Cathy said...

Anne - thanks.

CJ - self- massage does help a little. I will go and ask the doctor if it doesn't stop soon. That's the thing about MS, the symptoms do come and go very randomly!

Sue - thanks for the tip. Funnily enough I just bought a new wheat bag yesterday as I couldn't find my old one anywhere, and yes it does help. I also got a very cute tiny little hot water bottle which I could use if no microwave available, eg at my parents house :)

Cx