Two months in- still going stronger

Two months in- still going stronger

I am still doing better after just short of two months since stopping the magnesium.

My breathing is much improved, especially at night. My general strength is improved.

Pushups are generally averaging around 15-20, with 25 to 30 on rare occasions. I am not sure why this discrepancy in amounts exists. It could be due to the time if day I attempt the pushups. I still take a multiple vitamin daily that has a highly absorbable type of magnesium. And I have noticed that if I take a day or two of my old magnesium supplement, my pushup total and breathing suffer.

This link to magnesium impacting my strength and breathing is troubling. It must mean something, but I am not the one to guess what. 

Pushups return, and did magnesium cause weakness?

Hi again to anyone that sees these posts.

I have been absent. Other things take precedence, at times. One thing I have talked about in the past is that magnesium has helped me, at least during and right after the attacks. It, for me anyway, helped to tone down the twitches and leg jerks that I had. I am going to suggest now that you watch out about taking it long term. Do breaks from it from time to time, to see if it is still helping or like I think happened to me, started to cause me more harm than good.

I have talked about my ongoing weakness. Some HNA sufferers report ongoing weakness and breathing difficulties. I had all of that. I never even thought about it at a certain point. It had become part of who I was. The weak guy over there who sits around while everyone else moves on with their lives. That was me. Maybe you are that person too. Or maybe you know someone like that. 

Since my attack, I have taken magnesium religiously. I have taken my own advice from time to time, and have stopped it for a week or two, until I would start to feel those familiar twitches start up again. Or I might feel tightness in general as my muscles tensed up. Magnesium is good to ease those things. It made them go away for me. And I could never stop taking it for long. It did seem to help. But, I had no idea that it also could be adding to my weakness even at the dose I was taking. I had no clue until the most recent time that I stopped.

It has been about a week now since I stopped my morning magnesium pill. And I feel so much better now. I fell less shaky in just doing everyday tasks. My breathing has improved. A couple of days ago, I tried to do some pushups. And I was amazed that on the first try, I could do 10.

Those 10 pushups were a bit shaky, but I was amazed that it was 7 more than I had been able to do for the longest time. So a half hour later, I tried again and did 20 with no shakiness. A half hour later I tried again and did 20 more. The next morning I did 15 and a bit later did 25 more. And now, for the first time in a very long time, the muscles in my arms are actually sore from that exertion. It feels amazing. I have to admit, I thought my doing any sort of exercise ever again, was a pipe dream. I felt like I was aging in an accelerated way with this disease to blame. And now I feel like I have part of my life back. Maybe because that magnesium is getting out of my system.

I know it has its place. I may use it again if I am in an attack. But, I feel like I will never just blindly take it just because I think it has helped in the past. After a while, at least in my experience, that help goes sideways and becomes more of a hindrance.

So, take it but watch out for possible problems of long term use. It might make you feel better at first, but it also can have opposite impacts in the longer run.

And maybe, it is all a coincidence and at some point my return of strength will go away, magnesium or not. 

I will let you know.    .  

A short update, and new issue- Hypoventilation in Neurologic diseases

By the way, since it has been a while since I have done anything here, this is a short update. . .

Overall, my strength is still a problem. I can do 3 push-ups, barely. One further issue with the push-ups is that my right wrist is not up to the challenge even if my shoulders were. That wrist has been a weak point all along, and seems worse now.

My legs tend to go through weak times as mentioned earlier. Currently, they are not too bad, and I can walk further and faster now than at other times recently.

Hypoventilation in Neurological diseases

One issue that seems to be a rare thing for HNA, but can occur, is an issue with breathing. In general, this is only a problem at night when I sleep, or at least try to. Since the last updates, I have had a pretty severe problem getting good sleep. I had an initial O2 saturation study done as I slept, which determined that I had several periods of desaturation during the night. A very expensive full sleep study followed, which was inconclusive, except for a suggestion that my periods of REM sleep were shorter and less frequent than normal. I think I had trained myself to avoid REM sleep because I sensed I could not breath as well during it. I think the doctors were looking for standard obstructive sleep apnea, and my case did not suggest that, so they stopped looking into it. My sleep returned to normal right after the study. Go figure. It is like research into electrical problems in cars. They are a problem for you because you drive your car all the time. When you are at a mechanic to get it fixed, the problem can't be reproduced for them to diagnose the cause, or to fix it.  

See this link for more on breathing issues and neuromuscular diseases

http://emedicine.medscape.com/article/304381-overview

“Neuromuscular disorders

Neuromuscular diseases that can cause alveolar hypoventilation include myasthenia gravis, amyotrophic lateral sclerosis, Guillain-Barré syndrome, and muscular dystrophy. Patients with neuromuscular disorders have rapid, shallow breathing secondary to severe muscle weakness or abnormal motor neuron function.

The central respiratory drive is maintained in patients with neuromuscular disorders. Thus, hypoventilation is secondary to respiratory muscle weakness. Patients with neuromuscular disorders have nocturnal desaturations that are most prevalent in the REM stage of sleep. The degree of nocturnal desaturation is correlated with the degree of diaphragm dysfunction. The nocturnal desaturations may precede the onset of daytime hypoventilation and gas exchange abnormalities.”

It has been a while. . .

Well, I am still here in case anyone has noticed an absence.  Not much has really changed except I am having some pain at times in my right shoulder and neck.  And I am a bit weaker overall.  Yesterday I could barely do one good push-up.  And it was very shaky as always.  I have also noticed slight arm pain in the area between humeral head and shoulder joint, particularly reaching out to pull a door closed as I enter a room.  I have begun to wonder about my breathing too.  I have seen descriptions and videos describing paradoxical breathing,  which can happen in the case of PTS/NA if you have partial paralysis of the diaphragm from phrenic nerve palsy.  


Look here

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RFGzdNFuXIM

I do not breathe that way all the time, but I have. Hmm.  Maybe I do more than I am aware.  This is just one more thing to ask a doctor about.

This one is interesting too.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=endscreen&NR=1&v=JeDiS7MWXNk

Seems every muscle group impacting PTS/NA is mentioned here as being an impact on correct breathing.  And it is suggested incorrect breathing can lead to what they call gothic shoulders. Looks to me like winging and a possible “what came first?” scenario.  Those shoulders could be related to what causes the breathing issue more than the breathing issue causing the stooped shoulder posture.