Balu back in his natural habitat in Tenerife |
Monday, 28 February 2011
Monday, 28 Feb 2011
Sunday, 27 February 2011
Signs and Symptoms of Autonomic Dysfunction
For my own purposes, I’ve
Some of the listed symptoms are always present while others occur when a person with Autonomic Dysfunction has been standing or sitting too long:
- -Dizziness
- -Light-headedness
- -Vertigo (room spinning or the sensation of spinning)
- -Feeling faint (pre-syncope)
-
-
Fainting (syncope) - -Chest pain or pressure
- -Excessive fatigue
- -Rapid heart rate (tachycardia)
- -Stomach pain
- -Intestinal cramping
- -Nausea
- -Vomiting
- -Retching
- -Exercise Intolerance: becoming short of breath on mild exertion, having chest pain or palpitations on mild exertion. Having excessive heart rate during or immediately after exercise. Leg cramps or numbness of arms and legs during or after mild exercise.
- -Visible pooling in arms and legs: Deep purple-red colour in fingers and toes.
- -White appearance of fingers. Some present with white patches of skin on arms and legs.
- -Extremely cold hands and feet.
- -Numbness of hands and feet.
- -Muscle weakness
- -Muscle and joint pain
- -Tremors or mild shaking of hands
- -Frequent headaches or migraine headaches
- -Irritability due to decreased blood flow to the brain
-
-Feeling anxious/
Having panic attacksdue to increased production of adrenaline - -Mood changes
- -Forgetfulness
- -Inability to concentrate or remember (frequently referred to as "brain fog")
- -Inability to tolerate changes in temperature
- -Decreased sweating or excessive sweating
- -Abnormal deep tendon reflexes.
- -Basic neurological exam is normal.
- -Intelligence normal when receiving adequate cerebral perfusion.
Less frequently recognized signs and symptoms:
- -Insomnia
- -Disruption of sleep/wake cycle usually consisting of increased energy late in the evening and lowest energy level in the morning regardless of amount or quality of sleep.
- -Central sleep apnea
- -Need to sleep 12-14 hours in order to complete simple activities of daily living.
- -Anoxic or convulsive seizures that are not epileptic.
- -Frequent need to urinate at night.
- -Upon standing feels head is "heavy". This resolves with lying down or with walking around.
- -Decrease in (or absence of) lubricating tears in the eye.
- -Sensitivity to bright, florescent light and bright sunlight. Many patients report feeling pre-syncopal in large grocery stores and department stores that use excessive florescent lighting. Flashing lights and multi-coloured lighting can also produce symptoms.
- -Visual distortion: Television screens and computer screens can appear distorted, especially post-syncopal or pre-syncopal episode. Flat screens are recommended.
- -Distorted depth perception resulting in a feeling of unsteadiness. Often appears to be "clumsy" or excessively cautious when climbing stairs, reaching for an object, etc.
- -Other visual disturbances include a greying out or blacking out of the visual field; either partially or completely.
- -Decreased awareness of what is in the peripheral visual field. This often causes the patient to startle because they did not perceive anyone or anything next to them.
- -Frequent "bumping into things". Attributed to a combination of visual and depth perception deficits.
- -Noise sensitivity. Loud or beating sounds can cause pre-syncopal episodes. Difficulty filtering out sounds. Easily distracted by sounds.
- -Sensitivity to odours, even pleasant smelling chemicals such as perfume. Odours such as cleaning products, gasoline, strong foods, etc. may cause extreme nausea, retching, vomiting, dizziness and headache.
- -Decrease production of saliva or excessive production of saliva.
- -Severe constipation and decreased gut motility.
- -Weight gain regardless of diet modifications.
- -Overall slowing of metabolism is common.
-
-
Increased metabolism (rare) - -Excessive gut motility leading to chronic diarrhoea and weight loss. (less common)
- -Sensitivity to touch. Mild pat on the arm or squeeze of the hand can cause excruciating pain especially right after an episode or if the patient has not had enough sleep.
- -Decrease sensitivity to pain/touch in certain areas. If standing or sitting too long causes hands and feet to turn cold and blue, patient will have decreased sensation in these areas due to poor blood flow.
- -Taste and appetite changes. Fruits and other acidic foods may taste extremely acidic. Foods may taste differently if patient is tired, stressed, or post-syncopal episode.
- -Hair loss due to decreased blood supply to hair follicles.
- -Speech disturbances: Inability to finish an expressed thought, loss of train of thought, "spoonerisms", especially if up and about for 2 hours or more without lying flat and resting.
- -Comprehension difficulties. Inability to follow a conversation. May hear words but is unable to understand their context in the sentence. Cannot focus on more than one activity at a time. May not realize they are being addressed. Losses conversation focus when topic is changed. Is easily distracted from the conversation focus by any environmental stimuli.
- -Memory recall deficits in long and short term memory. Improves with lying down and resting.
- -Abdominal migraines. Severe stomach pain triggered by large meal or by sitting or standing too long. Usually resolves if patient lies quietly.
- -Drifting to the right or left when walking. Most commonly patients report drifting to the left. Many patients report always fainting to the left as well. Appears to be unrelated to hand-dominance, but further research is needed.
- -Tend to have mild symptoms of Ehlers-Danlos, but do not necessarily test positive for the disease. This includes hypermobile joints, double joints, and soft, velvet-like skin that has little or no texture.
- -Often has another auto-immune disorder.
- -Family History of auto-immune disorder or symptoms that resemble autonomic dysfunction.
- -Appears to have more viral illnesses than general population. Often diagnosed with Chronic Fatigue Immune Dysfunction Syndrome.
Monday, 21 February 2011
Monday, 21 Feb 2011
![]() |
Perch style bus stop: utter torture and adds inaccessibility to disabled people. |
Same old, same old … Woke up with feverishness again. Shaky and nauseas as soon as I move to do anything. Neck hurting more than usual. Today, I had an appointment with the Rheumatologist. Decided to try the bus to get to the hospital. Sensibly took a soft collar to help avoid more neck pain. Walk to bus stop was too far and the seat in the bus shelter was more of a ledge and entirely unsuitable and just added to my discomfort. Even turning my head to be able to cross roads on the way to the bus stop or look for the bus approaching was unbearably painful and each time caused a severe shooting pain accompanied by more nausea. The long, jolting bus ride was tortuous. However, expecting the usual “we found nothing” result, I was quite shocked by the diagnosis of cervical spondylosis (arthritis of the spine). Mind you, because of ME and my usual issues with drug reactions, this will be difficult, if not impossible to treat.
Tuesday, 22 Feb 2011
Despite having been out yesterday, I went out again today to a talk to learn about myofascial release, in hopes that this may be able to help with my issues. The rheumatologist yesterday had said that I need to try to get the fibromyalgia under control in order to reduce the pain from the arthritis (not sure how). It was a good afternoon, but involved another, long, taxing journey by bus.
Wednesday, 23 Feb 2011
The result of two outings on the previous days – despite being relatively short and in any case merely for hospital and therapeutic reasons – was THE most excruciating pain all over, which showed no signs of abating all day. As well as unbelievable neck pain from the jolting of the bus journeys, all my joints were clicking painfully, my skin feels tender and bruised everywhere and my muscles as if strained. Was unable to get up even to make food as could not moved for the severe fatigue. Had to take a nap in the afternoon.
Thursday, 24 Feb 2011
Still feel sore and bruised all over from the outings. My joints all feel like they’re assembled wrong and I am still very fatigued – I mean more than normal. Unable to concentrate on anything. Staying on bed, as usual.
Friday, 25 Feb 2011
Feel absolute crap again. Still really sore overall and woke up with especially bad neck pain that continued throughout the day, making it once more impossible to sit up without cushions to support my neck to mitigate the pain, which does not respond to painkillers.
Saturday, 26 Feb 2011
Neck pain is not improving and is only partially relieved by immobilising it with neck cushions. Any movement, even light stretching, just causes an increase in the pain. My eyes are painful again and I am still more fatigued that usual. Pushed myself to fill in application for counselling.
Sunday, 27 Feb 2011
The neck pain still just won’t let up. I’ve tried gentle movements (exercises, stretches), but that currently just makes it worse. I’ve tried immobilising it, which does help, but only while I’m reclining – it doesn’t give any lasting relief and means starting again from scratch every time I’ve had to move to go to the loo, whatever. Maybe amputation would help? I am so tired and yawning today, it’s as if I hadn’t slept. Cannot concentrate at all.
Thursday, 17 February 2011
Brain shakes
You know the images you see when your eyes are closed, well those were “jumping” in time with the pulsations, just like the picture of an old analogue TV, when the horizontal and/or vertical hold went squiffy.
In addition, I felt dizzy and nauseous. You know the sort of dizzy and nauseous that you normally lie down to escape from … except, of course, I was already lying down, so there was no means of escape from it until I, eventually, fell asleep again. It was all this and this, without the drugs.
This morning I woke with a stabbing headache and felt sick and shaky as soon as I moved. I have sensations of “brain shakes” often, but never quite this bad.
Monday, 14 February 2011
Monday, 14 Feb 2011
![]() |
Tuesday, 15 Feb 2011
Wednesday, 16 Feb 2011
Thursday, 17 Feb 2011
Friday, 18 Feb 2011
Saturday, 19 Feb 2011
Sunday, 20 Feb 2011
Monday, 7 February 2011
Monday, 7 Feb 2011
![]() |