Saturday, February 27, 2010

Suicide Disease: Trigeminal Neuralgia

So my mom went to the neurologist a few weeks ago and had an MRI done because she was losing sight in her right eye all of a sudden but nothing is wrong with her eye. They found some abnormalities in her blood vessels in her brain. They don't know what's causing it. It could just be stress. She needs to go back in in a month for another doctors visit. She has been doing better and hasn't had an episode with her eye for a few weeks now which is good because it was causing her a lot of frustration.
I called my dad to tell him what was going on with my mom and it turns out that HE is seeing a neurologist as well!!! They believe he has Trigeminal Neuralgia . He has been experiencing sharp horrible shooting pains on the side of his face. There seems to be a "trigger point" on his scalp where if he just barely brushes against that tiny spot, it will send these horrible shooting pains down his face. It also happens randomly as well. I guess people will go to the dentist and have all their teeth removed thinking it's something to do with their teeth thinking it will bring them relief but the pain is still there. It has also been called the "Suicide Disease" because so many sufferers of the disease have taken their own lives due to the excruciating pain caused by this whacked out nerve. They have treatments for it and you can have surgery for it as well which apparently involves going inside the skull to deaden the nerve.
Anyways, what's up with that?? Both parents seeing neurologists?? That's not cool!
hopefully they can figure everything out here soon with both parents and they can get back to feeling 100% again. Please keep them in your prayers.

2 comments:

Cherish said...

How scary for both you and them. I hope they're able to find the problem with your mom and find an easier fix for your dad....and that these things aren't hereditary! Since I've inherited all sorts of lovely things from my parents, I know how annoying that can be.

Jaime said...

Freaky! It's amazing all the weird things that can go wrong with our bodies that we've never even heard of or thought about.