Somatization Disorder/Chronic Pain Syndrome Story

All my problems started late 2007. Problems sleeping mostly, felt like my heart was beating way too fast. During the day I'd be 100% fine. Then as time went along I'd start experiencing chest pain when laying down to go to bed. I guess at the time I just felt like I may have been experiencing minor general anxiety problems.

Eventually, things would start getting worse. I'd start to experience discomfort in my chest while sitting at my desk at work. It would just drive me crazy, but I still did not see a need to visit a doctor because I would purposefully physically exert myself and I never had any problems doing so.

Then one day out of nowhere, I guess roughly 2 months or so after first experiencing chest pain/discomfort during the day, right when I was about to leave work, I felt like I was having a heart attack. It literally felt like my chest was going to explode. Had to go to the ER, seriously at that time, I didn't know if I'd actually make it. So I get there, and they run the necessary tests right away, EKG, things of that nature. Everything was fine there. So they started giving me concoctions to drink, which apparently are given to quickly determine if you are experiencing severe acid reflux. And that is what it happened to be. Needless to say I was relieved. I ended up walking back to work where my car was and went home.

The nasty severe acid reflux persisted for months. Within the first few days I went to a Gastroenterologist, and was told how to properly take my omeprazole (generic Prilosec), which is a acid blocker and was told if my reflux did not get better within 6 weeks I should give them a call. So, of course, it does not get better. I call them and set up an endoscopy. They go down your esophagus with a tube that has a camera attached so they can check everything out and also to take a couple of biopsies. Once again I was relieved, they could not find anything wrong during the procedure. However, when results from my biopsies came back, I was positive for eosinophilic esophagitis. Treatment for that did not help anything at all, which was disappointing and I also tested negative for allergies which are supposed to be closely linked.

As time went on though, new symptoms and pains started to occur. I'd have problems breathing, where it just hurt so bad, I had to go get checked out for that, chest MRI and xrays. They come back normal. (as is the common theme from here out with all testing) I'd have problems just walking around. I'd literally be walking one foot in front of the other. I also started to experience what I thought were esophageal spasms, nutcracker or diffuse, I forget which, but it doesn't matter anyway, because I wasn't really having them. This is chronic, ever since, torquing, squeezing, crazy up and down motions, feeling like my esophagus is turning inside out, beyond explanation or description. Then came the head pain. It was just a subtle throb at first, but instantly right away, I was thinking 'uh-oh', because it was so weird and different than anything I've ever experienced before. Then I'd start feeling pain right behind my eyes, I figured my eye muscles were spasming, of course they weren't. Another trip to the ER to get the noggin examined by MRI, which ended up coming back ok. They noticed some things, but nothing that needed to be treated, they also noted my chronic sinusitis which started back in '04, so nothing new there. Eventually the head pain started to mimic what my chest pain was feeling like. So yeah, it feels like my brain is turning inside out, it feels like it's squeezing, and torquing, and it's just so incredibly unbelievable that I just cannot believe the human body is capable of doing this, especially with no organic physical findings which can explain it. Then I felt pain in my groin area, more of a discomfort that I couldn't notice if I were really occupied. So now, pain is running from the top of my head, straight down through my chest, down to my groin. Crazy. I worked for probably 5 months going through all this simply because I thought eventually I'd get better, then a day just came where enough was enough and I couldn't do it anymore. Quit working fall of '08, haven't worked since.

Haven't got better at all either. I take that back, my severe acid reflux went away, which was by far the gnarliest thing I think I went through. Imagine someone sticking a funnel down your throat and unleashing an unending stream of acid down it, just reverse the direction, instead of down your throat, it's coming up from your stomach constantly, your esophagus will actually feel sore and raw and you can feel it heel when things aren't so bad. Only people who have experienced it know what I'm talking about, it is nothing like the common regular heart burn everyone gets. Various things wax and wane here and there. But the base component of pain from head to groin constantly every waking second of every day is still there. Pain has branched out at times to my limbs, most notably my right shoulder at one point making my whole arm basically useless, even after everything before, this still just boggles my mind because there isn't anything wrong with my arm. Every movement I make is painful. Eating, swallowing, talking, all difficult. Sometimes eating is reduced to things like soup, sometimes I can't brush my teeth due to pain. The only relief comes from when I actually get to sleep. Sleep is so difficult to come by, sometimes it takes 2-5 hours to fall asleep, sometimes 8 hours or more. Every so often I need to stay up 24 to 48 hours before I can fall asleep. Just need to get the body to the stage of needing it so bad that it just has no choice.

I don't want to cover everything in great detail as far as treatment is concerned. I'll just go over the basics. I have tried countless types of anti-depressants, which do not help (often antidepressants are prescribed for chronic pain as well). I've tried going to a pain management clinic, which tried a nerve blocking shot, and more medications for which I do not remember the names of, I just remember many were for spasms or fibromyalgia. Also I was given a TENS device, some sort of electrical stimulation thing for altering pain signals or whatever, this did not help. And of course psychiatrists/psychologists, who do not help either, mostly because they have no more clue what to do than a primary doctor or any other specialist. In fact I had to mention somatization disorder to my primary care doctor who is an internist, so now it shows up on my record in addition to chronic pain syndrome.

Through my own internet searching though, I came across doctors who feel that dangerous repressed emotions can mount up and end up causing physical symptoms. All this made the most sense to me. I won't go into detail about this either, but doctors whose books I've read include John E. Sarno, David D. Clarke, Scott Brady, and Howard Schubiner. I have followed their programs, all to no avail. This was really disappointing because this gave me the most hope.

4 full years now of this chronic pain and I still feel just as lost as ever. 4 years being a drop in the bucket compared to the future of decades more of dealing with this. I will keep up what hope I can for some new crazy medical break through that can help people with somatization disorder. However the prevalence being .2% of the male population, and .2 to 2% for females, doesn't really seem to bode well for any significant direct research. I know MDMA (ecstasy) or other hallucinogens may be something down the road that yields an effective medication, I just hope it's sooner rather than later.

I would like to hear other stories, and what success, if any, anyone has had in their treatment for this condition.

Hello, houseofpain, welcome to the forum! I hope you will find what you need here, feel free to make more posts or threads.
Have you ever found a psych who specializes in this illness, by the way?