One-sided pain in leg….

    • Anonymous
      October 30, 2007 at 8:31 pm

      I’ve had CIDP since Feb 02 but have really been experiencing pain in the right side of my body for over two years. At that time I began feeling pain on the right side of my body when I would try to lie on it in bed at night. So, for over two years now it’s only the left side of my body that touched a mattress. Anyway, I almost always now have the right sided body pain regardless of what side I sleep on. What has changed is that the pain is now more severe, lasts much longer and is much more predominant in my right buttock,goes up to my waist, and down my right leg…..it is also worse when I move….get up out of a chair, get out of bed…..start walking….even just bearing weight or leaning forward.

      Does anyone know if this kind of unilateral pain is related to CIDP? I also have back “issues” and am unsure if it is related to that. I have so much pain, I’m used to it, but it’s getting worse.

      Thanks so much,

      Sheila in WV

    • Anonymous
      October 31, 2007 at 1:30 pm

      Sheila,

      CIDP is a demyelinating Polyneuropathy. The action of the disease is that the immune system attacks and destroys the myelin sheath that surrounds the nerve axon. Once the myelin sheath is destroyed, or damaged, the ability of that nerve to conduct signals is diminished. Let’s not deal with why it got that way, but essentially that is what is happening.

      Nerves feed all that happens in the body. Each nerve is it’s own pathway to the spinal cord. Imagine the road that you travel to work is only for you. No other cars can drive there. That is what the nerve pathways are like. The reason that CIDP usually manifests from the feet back up to the knees, etc is that the longer nerves have more exposed myelin and are therefore more susecptible to damage.

      The polyneuropathy part means it happens in more than one place. CIDP is usually bilaterally symmetrical, meaning that it happens on oth sides, usually at a similar rate. Think about it, the immune system travels all over the body, not usually just in one side of the body or the other. A pain that manifests itself on one side over the other, for a continual period of time, would be contradictory to the process.

      The back, on the other hand, is extremely lefty or right side oriented. The nerves exit from the spinal column through holes in the spinal vertebrae. As you move about, the nerves move with you and transmit their signals. If you have a back injury it usually happens to one side or the other. The area that the nerves have to exit the spine narrows and the nerve gets pinched. The pinched (or crushed) nerve radiates pain from the point of injury down the nerve pathways where it reports pain all along the way . The pain gets back to the brain, and you writhe in angony. Or keep walking down the street, depending on how bad the pain is.

      If you combine the two (or more) pains, the symptoms become more difficult to separate. What part is from the back? What part is from the CIDP? What part is from the tendonitis you had as a younger adult? You see what I mean? That is why treating pain is such a challenge.

      Neuropathic pain like tingling, burning, white hot burning spots, contrast themselves with shooting pains from the back or hips, maybe tendonitis, or whatever. Each pain has a treatment, the hard part is to identify what pain and how severe. How much is inflammation? and what is being inflamed?

      If you sit down and try to identify each set of pains and how and when they affect you, and then take that to your Doctor, he/she should be able to work on treatment.

      Good Luck
      Dick S