Pseudotumor Cerebri Support Group
Pseudotumor cerebri (PTC) is a neurological disorder that is characterized by increased intracranial pressure, in the absence of a tumor or other diseases affecting the brain or its lining. Diagnosis requires brain scans and lumbar puncture. Characteristic symptoms are headache, transient visual obscurations or transient visual loss in one or both eyes usually lasting...
I think Betty and I have eluded to this before but, several times since my shunt surgery I've gotten this intense and horrible pain down the back of my head into my neck. It's not on the side of my shunt, but rather more central along the back of my skull into my neck. The pain is kind of like an ice cream headache. The pain is intense and scary. It comes out of nowhere. It lasts anywhere from one to five minutes, but it scares me. I swear every time it happens I feel like I'm having an anuerysm. I can't move my head and it's very painful. It happened the night before I landed in the hospital and then happened again yesterday. Has anyone else had this?
Have you ever tried lyrica? It is a non-narcotic pain killer specifically for nerve pain. I had it for a nerve problem in my arm, but when PTC started I started taking it daily and I think it helps with these shocks as well as the extreme pain I have in my jaw, face, neck, etc. that I get with a high pressure HA.
The down side to lyrica is it doesnt have a generic yet so is not cheap and it takes a few weeks before you get the full benefit.
I'm sorry you are having this pain and happy to hear that Lyrica is helping. Unfortunately though, this pain is different. It's not like a nerve shock...It's a pain...kind of like a muscle pull....but, it's like my brain is being sucked into my spinal column. It really hurts. Hmmm???
Also the nerve pain I have started out feeling like muscle pain and progressed to what it is now. When it first started I would get big knots in my neck at the base of my skull. Have you ever felt any knots in your neck? For a while muscle relaxers helped, I think I tried 5 or 6 different ones as it got worse. My DR said he believed the muscles were contracting and swelling causing the nerves to become irritated.
It doesnt sound like lyrica would help you. I hope you are able to find something that does help soon! I know stress can only make pain worse.
If it's the same thing, it scares the heck out of me too. I get paranoid too and think there's an aneurysm but then I realize that I just had an MRI a few months ago and they would've seen any aneurysms since they take a while to develop. Have you found that it helps to rest your neck/head? Whenever I get these pains, I lay back in a recliner and rest my head/neck.
I get the same type of thing, every tiem i move to fast, stand up from sitting (even slowly), bening over to pick something up, and even mroe things...anyways every tiem i do one of those i get "whiteouts" rather than blackouts and my head is stabing pain from the base of my skull to my eyes and between my ears. It only last a few mins but its worse than most other pains ive had. So far dr has said nothing about it, i hope your dr is better maybe he will give you some sugestions, unlike mine who basically said learn to deal w/ it.