Bell's Palsy and Neck Pain - Part 3

Part 3 - Antibiotics Round 3

Okay, on Monday February 6, I called the specialist and requested a second round of azithromycin. They did fill it, but they weren't convinced that the Bell's Palsy and the infection are connected.

Well, as I've mentioned in parts 1 and 2, my experience implies something different. For the first time since all of this began, my headache pain has virtually disappeared. I say virtually because the nerve is still mildly inflamed, but I don't feel the pain traveling along the nerve through the back of the head. Painkillers weren't working on the pain.

Taking in the entire picture and going by my own personal experiences with migraine headaches, I pretty much figure this latest head pain was tied directly to the nerve.

Now, considering my past experience - when I've had sinus infections, the migraines wouldn't go away until the infection had been dealt with. No amount of painkillers would or could touch them, not even Imitrex.

While I felt crappy earlier (around 7pm last night, I haven't slept yet), I notice that right now (5:47am, Feb 8), my neck only feels mildly stiff but overall breathing is better, my left ear doesn't hurt, and the pressure in my right ear has diminished. It's not completely gone yet, but it's getting there.

So, I've seen improvement in the infection, and I've seen a reduction in the head pain caused by the 7th nerve. The reduction in head pain implies that the nerve isn't as inflamed as it had been earlier.

Okay, so considering this, one can deduce that the improvement in the infection correlates directly with the reduction in head pain. Therefore, it can be said that the improvement in the infection correlates directly to the reduction in inflammation of that 7th nerve.

This brings me to my conclusion that the infection is responsible for all of this, and it will go away when the infection is cleared up. 

So far, I can say that the infection isn't completely gone, and neither is the facial paralysis. It's about 90-95% gone.

I hope that this third round will do the trick. If not, I'm not so sure they'll be willing to give me another round. However, I'm not seeing improvement as fast I had last week, but I'm seeing improvement, so that is good. Whatever infection this is, it really dug in deep.

To give you an idea of some of the weirdness I've noticed - when I massage the area around the nerve (muscles, etc), I feel thick fluid move into my throat and some movement in my ear. In fact, when the fluid moves, my right ear gets a little itchy. Seriously, the fluid has been so congested for so long I'm surprised it's moving now.

How do I know I still have an infection in my sinuses?

Well, I am still seeing dark yellow mixed in with the stuff I blow out of my nose. The chunks aren't that big and they've gotten smaller as the infection improves, however they still remain to gunk up the works.

I've got 3 days of meds left, so I hope I see some more improvement soon. If the discoloration of the mucus/phlegm doesn't change to it's normal clear color by Friday, I will phone again and ask for the round to be extended. I don't want to give this infection any more days to grab hold of my system. I just want to knock it out and be done with it already. I've had it longer than a month. I mean, I sat on it for awhile (at least a couple of weeks before the facial paralysis started) trying to let my body deal with it. I think it's more than proved it can't deal with this one on it's own. I'm off for some sleep now.  

Bell's Palsy and Neck Pain - Part 2

Part 2 - Treatment with Medication 

Okay, when I found out my MRI was clear and that it "was safe to call it Bell's Palsy" - no, this is not a definitive diagnosis because there are no clear indicators what's causing the facial paralysis. However, what else do you call 7th nerve facial paralysis?

One of my first concerns with all this happened to be the other meds I take. I needed to know if it was safe to take Mucinex-D, Allegra, naproxen sodium, as well as the other supplements I take while taking prednisone.

Turns out that it's safe to do so.

I've been taking Mucinex-D, Allegra, naproxen sodium and the following supplements before I was even diagnosed with this:

CoQ-10 100mg

Acidophilus 1 capsule

Cinnamon 1,000mg

Milk Thistle 175mg

Vitamin E 400 IU

Flax Seed Oil 1000mg

Cranberry 450mg

As of yesterday, I started using Triple Strength Cranberry which has 2000mg (2 g) per capsule as well as 100mg Vitamin C (167% daily value) and 10% of Vitamin E and Vitamin D3 (400 IU). Flax Seed Oil provides a source of Omega 3's (rather than fish oil), and I'm strongly considering adding in a Vitamin B complex. I briefly contemplated adding Zinc, but if I do, it would have to a small dose because it does seem to be in enough of what I eat that I shouldn't be deficient in it, but one never knows...

I added a B-Complex, but it seems like it might have been too strong of a dose, so I think I'll be looking to cut it down a bit to a level that makes sense for my body.

I finished my second round of antibiotics on Saturday February 4th and the prednisone a day or two before that. I had been worried that the prednisone made my facial nerve recovery possible, but now that I take in the whole picture - then up to now - I see that the likely impetus behind the quick recovery of my facial nerves would be the antibiotics.

Unfortunately, while I've made great progress while on the azithromycin, I didn't make any headway on the Amoxicillin and the infection got really out of hand. It got to the point that my breathing was terrible. The prednisone helped a ton, which is why I had some misconceptions about it, but it wasn't the cure all I first thought, which is why I had to get a stronger antibiotic.

I'm not completely healed, and I'm worried that I might start to backslide now that I'm done with the azithromycin. I believe that because, while I felt great enough to play disc golf on Saturday (mild pain in my right ear only), by Sunday morning I was feeling pain in my left ear and the pain in my right ear sort of picked up again. I ended up sleeping all day. I feel better, but I still feel a mild pain/congestion in my left ear. Since I'm feeling it in both ears, I know the infection isn't completely gone. However, because it improved so drastically while I took the azithromycin, I know I can get better with another round of antibiotics.
 
I'm almost there, just not 100% yet.

If what I've learned means anything, the key is keeping that nerve down.

Here's what I mean. Saturday night, I felt it flare up - in fact it kept me up a bit Saturday night and I had to ice it down. Then, I noticed a return of some of the pressure, etc. on the nerve and a small amount of tingles returned to face.

The connection between the infection/facial nerves and the effectiveness of the antibiotics can't be ignored. At this point, especially because the infection isn't completely gone, I do not believe waiting to see what happens is the right option.

I'm going to call the specialist and ask for another round of antibiotics because I'm tired of feeling sick, and I would love to be healthy - or damn close to it - by Valentine's Day.

I guess what it boils down to is that a "wait and see" approach just doesn't work for me, especially when a treatable infection is involved. It got as bad as it did in the first place because I was "waiting to see" if my body could deal with it and obviously it can't deal with this thing on its own...

Neck Pain and Bell's Palsy - Part 1

Part 1 - Leading Up to the Diagnosis

Hey all!

I haven't posted since last April because...well...the continuous migraines just became too much to handle, and once I started mending, I needed to withdraw from everything.

I withdrew partially to encourage my healing, but the other part was due to embarrassment because I had let so many people down when I neglected all the book blogs. So, I buried myself in the world of anime.

This jaunt into the world of anime taught me much about my own writing as well, but that's for another post. As I healed, I began to reach back out into the internet world, beyond just playing FB games.

Then, just as all began to seem right with the world - hey, I was managing my pain, I was able to get out and be active even during cold weather, and I began working seriously on one of the stories I've thought about for some time. Not just hacking out the story, but building it using a sort of outline - something I've never done before. So, yeah, I thought things were going great.

Then, on January 20, I came down with a pain in the neck. No, not a vampire, a literal pain in the neck. While the pain didn't assert itself until a Friday night, I believe it had been building and began manifesting itself through the eye "ticking," "fluttering," or whatever you want to call it. At first I thought my eye was just "fluttering" (rapidly opening and closing) because the air in the condo was dry. That had been going on for at least 5 days prior to the pain I began to feel in my neck and head.

At this time, I must go back a little as I realize some other facts may be relevant. Roughly Monday of that week (Jan 17), I started to feel like I was getting a sinus infection, but waited a day thinking it might have just been congestion caused from allergies to dust (I hit a couple of dust pockets along the way while I was cleaning the kitchen and other related areas)...

Okay, so now that I look even closer at my own recounting, I'm beginning to wonder if the "eye flutters" started even earlier, such as the Friday to Saturday before that (Jan 13, 14), than I'm recalling and I just didn't pay attention to it.

Anyway, our new fridge was coming Wednesday (Jan 18), and the last thing I wanted was to be was ill. When getting ready for the fridge, I stumbled upon some current unused antibiotics (Amox, Clav) that I had to stop using before because it made the migraine that came with the last sinus infection that much worse (I had been off caffeine at the time, so I had no real recourse to deal with the migraine pain in the first place and sure couldn't tolerate it getting worse) that were still good. So, I started taking them. That was about early Tuesday (or late Monday night). By about Wednesday, I noticed that my ability to taste foods had disappeared and was replaced with an oily taste/coating in my mouth. It was very weird and something I had never experienced before that I can recall. I thought that the antibiotics were responsible and thought that even though the bottle said the meds were still good that maybe they went bad, and stopped taking them.

[Note: I know, I know self-medicating, blah, blah, blah. However, I'm prone to sinus infections and have been for years. I get on average 4 to 6 of them a year. If the meds aren't working initially, I'm not going to throw out good money because it just means the meds aren't working because I waited too long to see the doc about said sinus infection, and it's nested deep in my sinus cavity. So, I save that which doesn't work one time for another time. It has saved me some trouble, especially when a sinus infection would crop up when I was out of state or camping...basically, I save those extra meds (on the rare occasions I have any) for emergency purposes only. Besides, once you've had as many sinus infections (I'm 39 years old and have been dealing from at least the age of 15. 24 years times 4 infections a year minimum equates to not quite 100 of them. Experience in getting them is just as valuable as a dr learning how to diagnose the symptoms...) as I have, you know when you have one without question. You also know when your body is capable of healing itself without help and when it's time to go to the doctor.]

Well, my sense of taste didn't return and the oily feeling/taste remained. By Friday night (Jan 20) I began to feel headache pain similar to a migraine, but it was accompanied by neck stiffness. Along with that neck and head pain, I felt all kinds of head pressure, much like a sinus infection, but only on one side of my face, which has happened to me before, so I didn't put much stock in it being anything different than a sinus infection. As it reminded me of a migraine and I get some relief using ice, so I started icing the area down.

However, by the next day (according to my husband's memory), I noticed that half of my face wasn't working, but I still felt some tingles and numbness (like you feel when you get a shot of Novocain), and I began to feel a little worried, but I wasn't going to let it put me in a tailspin. Positive thinking can do wonders when dealing with weird stuff.

In fact, I felt pretty good that morning and got all bundled up to go out disc golfing at Tendick (a disc golf course in WI). I even went so far as to enjoy a Baltic Porter from a local brewery (Silver Creek in WI) after we finished the round. The beer was okay, but the taste  was extremely muted. Normally, I consider that beer to be quite decent, so between the continued lack of taste and the facial paralysis/tingles, I knew something was not right and had plans to contact my doctor on Monday morning anyway.

Unfortunately, my body had other ideas. Saturday night (Jan 21), the pain in my neck and head returned with a strange sort of vengeance. It hurt, a lot. I felt like the right side of my face was going to explode. However, I needed to know where this pain was stemming from so I could give the doctor as much info as possible. Not only that, but I felt that if I knew where it stemmed from, I could get a better idea of what I was dealing with myself. Eventually that night, the pain sort of "settled" on the neck, head, and right side of my face with a loci behind/below my right ear.

There was something different about this pain though. It wasn't throbbing, but felt like the area was "burning," as if on fire. Okay, so by this point, I realized that this head pain could do some damage if I couldn't get it to calm down, not to mention drive me crazy. So, I began icing it down again, but not at 20 minute intervals like I was doing the night before, but constant - this was around 6pm Saturday night and I continued to ice it through the night (as long as I could control the position of the bottle of ice) and the next day.

By Sunday (Jan 22), I was feeling even more miserable and beginning to wonder what could be causing this. I was able to actually figure out from a Google search that it was possible I was suffering from Bell's Palsy - depending on the cause.

See, I've had Chicken Pox 3 times in my life: once in grade school and then again when I was in my 20s (early and late). Due to the fact that these later episodes came on the heels of vaccines for chicken pox, understanding how diseases like to mutate, the fact I worked in the daycare industry at the time, and considering how close in time those later two outbreaks were, I honestly believe (and still do) that I have come in contact with 3 different strains of the chicken pox. If a flu virus or other virus can mutate, why not chicken pox? That line of thinking always made sense to me. So, when I saw that one cause of Bell's Palsy could be the chicken pox (shingles) virus, I began to wonder if that was what I had.  

The morning of Jan 23rd, I called my primary care physician and left a message to fill him in on what happened over the course of the weekend. I saw him later that morning. While I managed to fill him in on as much as I thought relevant, I did leave out the part about the antibiotics...my head hurt so much by this point that I forgot to mention it, plus I felt that I just wasn't being heard.

I honestly felt that I was suffering from a bad sinus infection/right ear infection because my right ear felt like it wanted to explode. He didn't seem concerned or anything. He just proscribed a low dose of prednisone (40mg to start, which is low when considering what many of the medical information out there says) and a barbiturate for the pain that other painkillers can't seem to touch. I even asked him, "Aren't you even concerned about the extreme pain by my ear? It really feels like my head is going to explode." (This may not be exact, but pretty close to what I actually said.) No, he wasn't. In fact, he told me to come back in about 3 weeks.

Three weeks! Um hello! If the pain in my ear continued, I was afraid I could be at risk to lose what little of my hearing I have left! Okay, I can hear, but I seem to have an awful lot of trouble understanding and hearing people due to fluid and what not from my allergies, and I know several people who have had ear problems and lost their hearing in one ear because nothing was done in a timely manner.

So, in the parking lot of my primary care physician, I called the offices of the ear, nose and throat physician I had seen on previous occasions for sinus infections my primary care physician didn't really want to deal with. They got me in on Wednesday (Jan 25th) with the physician's assistant. They were going to delay that a week and have me see the man himself (Dr. Kandula), but my concern over the extreme pain in my ear and my strong feelings that a sinus infection could be behind all this helped them decide that coming in sooner could be to my benefit.

The blood tests my primary care doc took were negative. That means that the usual suspects he was testing for (Diabetes being one of them, and I am assuming the chicken pox virus being one as well) were not the cause. I ended up getting an MRI on Thursday (Jan 26th).

Luckily for me, the MRI results didn't show anything bad, which is a good thing.

So, what did the specialist/physician's assistant proscribe?

A higher dose of prednisone (than what my primary care physician, which was a 40mg taper) - a 60mg taper (60mg for 3 days, 40mg for 3 days and 20mg for 3 days) - as well as 10 days of amoxicillin.

See Part 2 for more info on how my recovery is going so far.