Eye socket Pain, Twitching, Drooping, Facial Numbness

[CrVala]

Hello,
I am a 24 year old female with TMJ and chronic neck pain.  I have been getting treated for the TMJ for a year and half, though I've had symptoms for it since I was 10.  I've been seeing a chiropractor for 4 months when my neck pain got worse instead of better like my TMJ doctor had told me.

For the past 5 months now, I have been having pain on the right side of the front of my head, eye, eyebrow area, eye socket, cheek, and right side of the nose.  This is also the same side my neck pain and jaw clicking occurs.  The pain is dull and achy, except for the on the cheeks, which can sometimes feel stabbing at the top of my cheek bone or the bottom of my eye socket, can't tell which it would be.   I also feel twitching sensations at the tip of my nose and sometimes in my eyelid.    Occasionally my cheek will just go numb, as if it's gone asleep.  It will stay like that for about 5 minutes, and I can still move my face when it happens.  

The most prominent pain is my neck and eye.  The other pain comes and goes (though still occurring everyday or every other day), but the neck and eye pain is constant and both in very specific spots.  The eye pain is in the upper corner, right where the eye socket meets the very top of the nose, where that curve is.  And I often feel it in my eye in the inner corner, when I move my eye that direction.   It hurts more when I touch and put pressure on that spot, as I've compared to what happens when I put the same pressure on the other eye's corner and it doesn't hurt there at all.

I should also mention that my eyelid is drooping.  I'm not sure if its considered the eyelid or part of the eyebrow area, but it is the skin directly below the eyebrow and directly above the skin that actually covers the eyeball.  It started drooping  very gradually, starting almost a year ago on the outer corner of the eye and now the drooping has spread full across the entire eye area from the outer to inner corner,  making that eyeball appear like its sinking down my face.

This is all extremely hard for me to deal with as I don't have health insurance and most of the doctor's I've seen have not been able to do full testing on me because I can't pay for it.
I've seen an opthamologist who just assumed it was allergies, did no tests, and just gave me eye drops.  When I came for a follow up 3 weeks later with my symptoms of course not improved, she said the same thing and gave me more eye drops.
I've seen a neurologist who told me that the appearance of my eye must have always been this way and I never noticed, and to do lighter less aggressive form of stretching so the neck isn't always in pain.  She also recommended I come back after I get insurance so I can get an MRI.
I saw an ENT who did a CT scan but found nothing wrong with my sinuses.  

So after having spent $800 on these doctor visits alone, I just don't know where to go next.  I was trying to save money by skipping a primary doctor (that I don't have anyway) and go straight to a specialty.  But now I don't know what specialty to go to.  I also would like to know how lower income people and students are able to get an MRI without paying full price.  

I appreciate any responses. thanks alot.

[Rena705]

I can relate to your problems, just paid $1150 for a spinal and pelvic MRI cause the neuro felt I needed it but couldn't get in with the government paying until next year and I am in too much pain to wait...but that's a whole other story!  I don't know much about medicine and I don't want to send you down the wrong path but you might find it interesting to Google Trigeminal Neuralgia. For the neuro that you saw to say that you probably never noticed your eye drooping before is a very moronic thing for him/her to say!  I have Paratrigeminal Neuralgia which consists of ice pick type pain in my right temple and my left eye drooping which is called ptosis.  Your eye drooping like that is NOT normal and neither is the pain you are experiencing! In my opinion you need to see a NEW neurologist and I am pretty sure that if you got yourself a primary doctor and he/she saw the ptosis (drooping of your eye) they would send you to a reputable neurologist immediately!  Like I said, I am not a doctor and it is in your best interest I think to do some investigating into how you can get some help to get a good doctor to look after you.  I wish you the best and I hope that you will stay in touch and let us know how you are doing.  Good Luck my dear and don't give up!
Rena705

[how123]

Hello,
  I had noticed on the web that many symptoms can result from the upper cervical   spine.  I have never been seen by these doctors but they  use digital infrared images to help determine issues with the spine.  I have no idea or recommend them but it is just a source that I came accross on the web.  
One of IUCCA chiropractors.
Again. I have never seen her or other IUCCA doctors so I cannot recommend them.  Just info for you.  Take Care.  

[CL1209]

I know you might think I am crazy but I URGE YOU to get a Western Blot Test.  It is a blood test to determine if you have Lyme Disease.  I also went years being misdisgnosed and ignored by doctors.  Lyme disease effects everyone differently and it immitates MANY different diseases and problems, which is why it goes undiagnosed.  I never saw a tick bite on my body nor experienced the flu-like symptoms they say you get, and yet 4 years later my doctor did the test and discovered that I had late-stage lyme disase.  I also had numerous MRIs, saw neurologists and many other doctors and spent thousands of $ while wasting time and getting worse.  It is an easy blood test but make sure you get the Western Blot.  All of the other tests don't detect it and even the Western Blot sometimes is wrong.  But headaches, eye pain, drooping eye, neck pain...all classic symptoms of late-stage lyme.  If you do find you have it PLEASE find a LYME SPECIALIST.  So many doctors know nothing about Lyme or how to treat it properly.  You only need a simple blood test and you may be shocked like I was with the results.