Hi guys, I'm an 18 year old male suffering with a small syrinx from C6 to T1 and this is really taking it out of me.

Background info:

 About a year ago I was lifting weights in the gym and a couple of days after performing some squats and deadlifts, I knew that something just wasn't right. My mood had changed. I was feeling nauseous after eating. There was a horrible throbbing in my neck that seemed to move my head slightly! The pain was dreadful. I visited the doctors a couple of times and they were all very dimissive, suggetsing that the pain and symptoms should subside very quickly!

About two months later in May of 2018, my symptoms had still not gone away. Infact, they had gotten much worse and I can remember one of my worst days being where I passed out onto my bathroom floor after experiencing a horrible sensation of vertigo. On top of this, I was still experiencing a horrible sharp, burning pain in my neck that was almost constant, nerve pain in my arms and legs, depression, brainfog, terrible anxiety and muscle spasms and twitches across my body. This was the final straw. I insisted on an MRI. I finally got one.

The spinal specialist that I saw to look at the MRI pictures with didn't seem concerned and stated that the syrinx (that they'd found from c6 to t1) shouldn't be causing any symptoms. This was extremely frustrating and once again I was lost. I also saw a neurologist to get a second opinion on the matter and he was also unconcerned and suggested that the syrinx had been with me for the whole of my life, so shouldn't be causing any probelms whatsoever. He told me to get back into the gym, start running and play football again. At this point (July 2018), all of the activities above were out of the question as I could barely cope on a day to day basis with managing my symptoms! He didn't seem to understand that doing these activities made my pain and symptoms worse. I was lost. I didn't know what to do next.

After this MRI, I stuggled on, trying to find new ways to cope with my symptoms and to be fair, I found an excellent little supplement that helped me greatly: CBD oil. This stuff was great. It recuded my symptoms massively and my pain dropped dramatically. My mood was lifted and my quality of life had increased dramtically. This lasted for about 4 months (between October 2018 and January 2019) until I had a horrible relapse...

From about November 2018 onwards, my activity levels had increased thanks to the CBD oil and I was able to get back into swimming and light weight lifting. I was feeling great. Life was good. I felt like the CBD oil could even shrink the syrinx in my neck as I was now experiencing pain and symptom-free days. Unfortunately, this wouldn't last for too long as in early January 2019, after upping the amount of weight I was lifting at the gym (I was bloody stupid to do this!) I felt a horrible burning pain whilst doing some shoulder presses on a machine. I'd pushed myself too far.

My old symptoms came flooding back to me a couple of days later and the CBD oil was no longer helping. I panicked. I spiralled down back into my old self, with my symptoms progressing every week. 

Now its late February and I'm slowly accepting that I may have just made my condition much worse. At this moment in time I really don't know what to do. When I look forward, I struggle to see a good future for myself as I'm struggling socially, physically and mentally on a day to day basis. I go to sixth form college at the moment and I've got my A levels in the summer so I really want to try and get this under control before then!

At this point in my life, I would be more than willing to try some stronger cannabis oil (perhaps with a much higher concentration of THC in it) however, I live in the UK so my options are really limited.

Would you guys recommend that I see a neurosurgeon about this to get another opinion (I've heard that they deal with syrinxes and stuff like that)? The spinal specialist and neurologist I've seen don't seem to know much about the condition so perhaps someone with more experience would be better?

Do you guys think a new MRI might be worth considering as my old symptoms have flared up and I've also developed new ones?

What sorts of exercise (if any) do you guys do to help out?

Have any of you experienced a reduction in the size of your syrinx without having surgery?

Cheers guys. Any support would be great. Hopefully, in the future, as technology increases and medicine improves, doctors can find a cure/reverse this dreadful condition but until then we just have to keep fighting! I'm only 18 so there's a chance that this could happen in my lifetime. Hope is really the only thing I've got at the moment.

Ben Robertson