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Is this really "just a migraine"

Hello,

At a bit of a loss of where I can go from here and would love a bit of advice for those who've been in a similar predicament.

So I am an otherwise fairly healthy 20 year old with a history of migraine which are fairly well controlled with propranolol. However, on the 29th I woke up with a dead arm which then developed quite severe spasms and tremors as the day went on. By that evening I also noticed that the vision in my left arm was blurred and I just generally felt quite disorientated to the point I got completely lost walking to the local shops and had to call my flat mate for help. The next day although some feeling had returned to my arm, the sensation was reduced and I had pins and needles in it and my fingers had curled and I couldn't keep them straight at all. By the 3rd day of this I had loss complete function in that arm with the spasms still present and now a crawling sensation in that arm. The next morning things started to progress more worryingly as my arm problems continues but now my right leg was weak and there was some altered sensation in my right foot and spasms now in the leg too, also became very dizzy and nauseous. By the next day some of my sensation in my arm was much better and the tremor was now only present when i was trying to use it however the movements on my right side were ataxic (jerky no fine motor control) and I could not walk in a straight line, my speech also became visibly slurred and the visual problems became much worse with a large black blind spot in the centre of my vision. No new symptoms have developed since then although the ones I've mentioned lasted around 8 days before beginning to clear up although my vision is still dim with a black spot in the left eye almost 3 week later.

Anyway so I finally managed to get in to see a GP yesterday, as I stupidly forgot to register with one when I started uni in September and got pretty much nowhere. He cut me off after around 10 seconds and diagnosed migraine with aura and told me to take an aspirin and sumatriptan (despite serious reaction to it in past) if it happens again. There was no real headache with nothing in my usual location (just a small pain lasting a couple of hours on the right side at the base of my skull).I've also had migraines for years which have never resembled this in the slightest. Anyway, my issue is he wouldn't carry out any further tests or refer me so I am at a loss of how to get to the bottom of this, do I go back for a second opinion as soon as possible or just wait to see if it happens again? Has anyone had migraine symptoms resembling this? Sorry for the rant just feeling very frustrated at the whole situation.

Thanks for anyone who's managed to read all that and any advice on where to go next would be fantastic,

Emi 😀

  1. Hi emi01,

    Thank you for sharing your story with us! We're glad you found us!!
    That certainly sounds like an alarming experience. I'm glad you sought out medical help, but with those symptoms, it sounds like more investigating is necessary. Typically symptoms stop when the migraine attack is over. And certainly vision issues do. If it were me, I'd probably get a second opinion, especially since all the symptoms have not stopped.

    Please let me know how you are doing and my apologies for the delayed response.

    Nancy

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