Pain around ribs while swallowing food

[dan6464]

Hi, I'm a 24 year old male and for the past 3 years I've been having a pain behind the right corner of my rib. The weird thing is when this started, it would come and go in about 3 month intervals. I would only feel the pain while swallowing down my food. It seems the bigger and more solid the food, the more i would feel the pain.

It's been now been 6 months and it's been getting worse. I'm starting to feel it hurt randomly throughout the day. I've also started to feel the same pain on the left side around the same spot as the right. Drinking coffee seems to aggravate the pain.

I had a chest xray about a year and half ago and my doctor said she saw nothing unusual and has no idea what it could be.

Does anyone know what this could be??

[ScalpMassager]

Yes, but if it's anxiety it's likely a phantom muscle tension pain anyway.  If the pain were consistent and often enough, you could challenge it by taking an anti-anxiety med like serax/oxazepam, to see if it faded right away (which, would confirm that it was anxiety caused).

I find camomille tea is almost as potent as a weak dose of serax, you might try that sometime.

[dan6464]

I'm not sure if it's my stomach. The pain is at my sides under my breast bone. near the corner of my rib cage

[ScalpMassager]

Might it be stomach pain in those regions?

If so, I'd strongly suspect anxiety (caffeine being an additional trigger on top of nervous tension, swallowing issues are a classic anxiety symptom too -- anxiety sometimes results in my esophagus closing right up at times and I can't eat or drink for perhaps half an hour; at one time I was getting so painful a tummy ache that I had to go on a prescription anti-anxiety med for a year).