Wednesday, September 10, 2014

Bells Palsy 10 years later

In 2007 I got Bells Palsy, my diagnosis, I would never recover. 

Most people recover within 2-4 weeks, at three weeks I was just starting to get a tiny hit of movement in my lip. When I would see people and children looked at my face with shock and I would always explain what happened. Men that had known me cried, and I couldn't understand why (not much for self-esteem)  I thought I "MUST" look like a monster. But now, I think more then that, they cried because they were afraid it would affect my personality, I am always so upbeat, happy, smiling and now one side of my face was frozen with my left eye wide open.

I always knew I had character but ...really...did I need more?

From 2007 - 2010, I went through periods of acupuncture, physical therapy, macro electrical stimulation and
things greatly improved, but it was an extremely slow, slow process, I would say that I about 80 - 85% recovery. 

Due to the expense of the Lyme treatment and my concern that the over stimulation sometimes caused spasms, such as a "jokers smile", (which horrified me) I would take breaks from the electrical stimulating of the muscles and nerves and knowing that the nerves grew so slow I decided that I needed to give up treatment on my face and focus on the treatment of the Lyme disease. 

Now 7 years later, I feel that I have given my nerves time to grow and am now starting acupuncture again to see what happens.

1 comment:

  1. Great post......Bell's palsy is a form of facial paralysis resulting from a dysfunction of the cranial nerve VII (the facial nerve) causing an inability to control facial muscles on the affected side.
    acupuncture nj

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