Until about a month ago, when it started again. Luckily, I had an appointment with the neurologist scheduled at the end of April, so I waited, and when it came around, I mentioned this mystery pain. TURNS OUT, when pain is aggravated by heat, it's muscular (i.e. not related to the nervous system)! Best news of the week, for sure.
But that's not my point - that pain diagnosis can be made by the method of aggravation. My point is the confusion. I had no idea how to tell if this was nerve-related, and therefore MS-related, or something else. In the beginning, I spent a good amount of time trying to think if I lifted something heavy, or slept wrong, or if there was anything I could have done to strain my neck/shoulder to cause this pain. Because my brain still, strangely, thinks more like a normal person than like a sick person when I attempt to figure my body out. After a while of thinking these thoughts, I determined that it had to be MS-related because it didn't go away. (Turns out the PA (p.s. PA's are the best!) thinks it's related to the fact that my job requires me to stare at my hands or a computer screen for almost my entire day. Seems too simple, but hey, the simplest explanations...)
So how do you know what your pain means? There are two things I can recommend in the real world of finding stuff out: 1. Know yourself. Know your body. This is not a dirty joke. It's simply that you know when you are in pain, and when it's something you can't take anymore. It's that there is no one else who is going to be able to know when something is wrong better than you. Which leads me to 2. SEE YOUR DOCTOR!! It seems so obvious, but I'm often hesitant to see a doctor, and a lot of other people are too. And it might just turn out that you need a massage, a trainer, or a physical therapist, and not a crazy medicine or an MRI or an acupuncturist or some other nuclear holistic experiment. Or see your Physician's Assistant, because she's probably more available, and a little more user-friendly :)
