New here! Arm pain, Hand pain/ Trigger finger - I need an opinion!

Hello everybody,

I am infinitely appreciative of you taking the time to read my story. Let me start by letting you know that I am a 24 year old male.

My concern about my health began when I started having panic attacks in March 2023 which at the time I did not know that it’s a panic attack and I thought that I was going to faint or have something bad happen to me. Then a series of symptoms began. It all started with half of the right side of my face feeling numb, so I decided to see a neurologist who specialises in MND and is a university lecturer on the subject. He told me from the start that there was nothing to worry about but gave me a brain MRI scan to take away the anxiety that I had something serious as I was worried about a brain tumour or MS. I had it done directly after 5 days of the visit and everything came out clear. The symptoms subsided after a while and came back stronger with several episodes of panic intense burning in the forearms as well as a feeling of pressure and pain in the right ear but I did nothing about them.

Then different but symptoms started to appear in a symmetrical form. I felt the 3 middle toes of each foot kinda numb when I was walking, meaning they didn't have a good grip with the ground or felt light, I don't know how else to describe it. Also the two little fingers on each hand seem to lock up as I open them but sometimes they are better especially when I wiggle them. Also that's when the muscle twitching started.

I visited another neurologist who is part of the research group of the first one and I explained what I was feeling and he assured me that there is nothing to worry about as I have passed the clinical tests and there is no atrophy or weakness in any of the parts I mentioned.

2 months later I visited my neurologist ( the first one ) again to present the new symptoms as along the way I developed some sensory ones like numbness and pins and needles and sharping nerve pains and the anxiety was killing me. He examined me to calm me down.
Then the pain and feelings from my toes one day just healed. Not 100% on the right one but a good 90%.

After that it was a bad neck pain on both sides that was killing me. A few days passed and I noticed I had a really bad upper back pain to the point it was impossible to sit on a chair.
all these are gone by now except the muscle twitches (which are much more mild and happen 2-5 times a day at random places and are not continuous, just a little twitch at a time)

Also for about a month now I feel this nerve pain from elbows right to my finger joints and wrist. Sometimes it is the left arm and hand and sometimes it’s the right. Sometimes form the outer arm sometimes it’s the inner arm.

I would like to advise that in the last few months I have also been consulting my psychiatrist who is a qualified neurologist and is also not concerned and rewards doctors who do not prescribe tests.

For the past 8 months I’ve done brain MRI’s, bloodwork (4 times) to rule out RA or any other thing etc., urine tests, and they all come back clear!

Yesterday though, a family friend came by that happens to be a great hand surgeon and I talked to him about my main concern which is my bilateral pinky trigger finger. And he showed me that he has it too and I was so surprised and relieved that every little numbness, tingling or pain I had disappeared. Then he told me to see it one more time, and my right pinky did not trigger! And he was like “It’s not doing it now man haha”. Indeed the triggering was not there but I felt the “weakness” and this filling that it was “dislocated” or something. Today, after that I feel that my fingers are softer and the pinkies trigger a lot less and not that much in pain though the burning is there still.

I learned about TMS three days ago and I already ordered Dr. Serno’s “The Mind Body Prescription”

I’m new to this so I could use an opinion to my symptoms! Especially the trigger fingers!

Thank you for the time you took to read my story!

 

Hi,

I got your message but I feel it’s better to post on here.

The one thing you are doing is focusing on each individual symptom and labelling them and worrying about them.

The problem is your anxiety, once you get control of that your body will start to heal. Think of it like this, your body after your panic attack is stuck on fight or flight response and what this does is restrict blood flow to the extremities which then after a period of time causing muscle tension as blood isn’t getting to your fingers etc. Are they cold when they shouldn’t be for example?

I’m still recovering but I know I’m on an upwards trajectory,

I had all the below….

blurry vision,
Muscle tension (inflammation everywhere but was told I was a medical mystery)
Trigger finger
Pretty much every joint in my body was stiff (slowly healing now)
Digestion issues and lost a ton of weight down to 9 stone and looked unhealthy.
Thought I was gluten intolerant but I wasn’t and now eat normally.
Heart palpatations etc

The only thing remaining now is my stiff toes, and stiff fingers and elbow. Everything else has slowly healed and got back to normal. The difference? I’m not stressed anymore.

Look up Shaan Kassam on YouTube, he has a ton of great videos of what happens to you during during anxiety. Once I understood what it was, I then went on anti depressants to give me a head start.

Within 4 days my heart palpitations had stopped, and ever since then (about a year ago) I slowly have seen massive progresses in my muscles finally realeasing in different parts of my body. I could barely walk and now I can walk fine, I eat whatever and I am putting weight on again.

Rather than worrying about your symptoms you need to let them be, welcome them and tell yourself ok it’s just anxiety and constantly tell yourself that. It is hard don’t get me wrong and it’s not a quick fix but slowly you body will start to recover and you will notice changes over the coming months. As I say Shaan Kassam on youtube really made me understand it all.