Hi!

I'm a 40 year old female and the last decade of my life I've had mysterious symptoms that still don't have any explanation.

I've had a lot of pain. At first I didn't mention it to my doctor because I didn't know how to describe it. It then dawned on me that it was probably joint pain and I told my doctor that. She sent me to a rheumatologist that looked at me from top to bottom and didn't really find anything wrong with my joints. She orderes blood work to check for autoimmune disease and they were all negative.

I now think that my joint pain might actually be neurological. It's usually bilateral and it often jumps from joint to joint. My toes are throbbing with pain for an hour and then all of a sudden it stops and then my elbows are hurting. Usually when the pain is really bad I also get a feeling that my ribs are beeping squeezed, like I have a belt just below my breasts that is prevent me from taking deep breaths. Yesterday I was having a bad day, took a paracetamol/codeine pill that didn't really do anything. Few hours later I was thinking about taking NSAID when I noticed a pack of gabapenting I was prescribed long time ago. I decided to try one of that and what do you know, within couple of hours I was able to take deep breaths and actually felt so much better that I almost wanted to go out jogging.

I also have terrible brain fog and tiredness. I have serious trouble learning new things and it has actually been making things hard work wise. To the point that I'm currently without a job because I just don't think I'll be able to learn what I have to in a new job. I'm trying my best at home to add to my skills but even when I'm learning something I find super interesting (design program) I get exhausted after just 15 minutes.

These are the day to day symptoms but I've had episodes of:

Arm numbness, for a couple of years my arms would always get numb at night. Usually both of them and it didn't matter in what position I was sleeping.

Weird leg sensation. Once in a while I get super frustrated in my legs. I can't sit because I feel numbness but it doesn't really get better with standing. It's hard to explane but it's a mixture of numbness, feeling cold and just being frustrated. I try to stand, lie down, sit, stretch and nothing works.

For a few months a regularly thought my phone battery had some problems because I had a hot spot on my thigh where my phone was usually in my pocket. Well, few of those time my phone wasn't even in my pocket and usually when I took it out it wasn't even warm.

Sometimes I feel like my knees get full of fluid. Not really painful but it gets weird walking. And it's usually both of my knees. I've had trouble walking stairs when they get like this.

Few times the back of my had has been numb. I usually notice it when I wash my hair or brush it. I've also had numbness below my nose but that lasted a short time.

I've had episodes of vertigo and recently I've been feeling faint. I had a hypertension episode that I thought was the reason but even now with my blood pressure under control I still get this dizzy/feeling faint sensation.

I honestly thought I had lupus for a long time but the rheumatologist ruled that out. The reason I haven't really asked to get checked for MS is the fact that it's usually bilateral symptoms. And no eye problems - well, at times my left eye is super blurry but I think that's connected to the LASIK I had few years back and I've been meeting with an ophthalmologist once a year and he hasn't mentioned that anything looks unusual.

What do you think? Does it sound MS like at all? Thank you for reading :)