Problem with swallowing and speaking.

[Kthenwhy]

This is my first post on this site, I saw some comments from people who seem interested in helping others and this gives me some hope. Cause I have not been able to find anyone to really help me out with my current issue yet (or seem to want to), and right now I'm pretty hopeless, cause my symptoms only seem to be getting worse day after day.

If you read this and respond, thanks in advance. I'm open to pretty much any information or criticism, my single solitary goal is to get my voice back... If I can. I hope i can.
Thanks.

Three months ago (around October 10th) I was singing in the car when I felt a sudden sharp pain in the right side of my throat. I sang a lot that day and now i know it was strain but back then i had no idea what it was. I stopped singing for a few days and then went back like nothing happened. But then one morning a couple days later, after singing loudly the night before, i had really bad dull achy feeling in the right side of my throat.
The pain isn't going away but I don't know what it is and i don't think much of it, I ask my parents and they say it's all in my head.
After a month and a half of pain i go to a party (november 15th) and end up talking and yelling a lot, the next day my voice is cutting out frequently, not cracking, just cutting out. Cut to a week later and now I have problems with swallowing, the right side of my throat is not doing what it needs to be doing.
I would've gone to the doctor when i first felt the pain but a week before the pain started my dad took me off of his health plan so he could save money, and I didn't really know what to do, plus no one seemed to think what i had was a big deal so i didn't think anything of it and treated it as such. Boy do I regret not thinking much of it.
I eventually got to see a laryngologist, on Christmas eve of all days, and all he said was that i had strain, and that my vocal cords were fine. Which was information that i definitely needed, cause I had no idea if it was my cords or not. But he didn't tell me any specifics, that's all of the information divulged to me. I asked him like, what muscle could it be, and he pointed at a diagram of the larynx, and said that there are so many muscles in the larynx that he can't name any of them. To me it seemed like he didn't care. I asked him if i could recover, he said he didn't know. I asked him why my voice quality was much lower and weirder than normal, and he said that he doesn't know what i normally sound like so he doesn't know.
Hes sending me to speech therapy and putting me on anti acid reflux meds.
I mean, I have the lowest medical insurance you can get so maybe that's why they aren't interested in helping me. I don't know. I'm open to any knowledge on this subject.

Throughout this whole situation, ever since my swallowing problem started, I've been extremely scared about this problem. My voice tires out extremely quickly now. I talk really quietly to avoid this, though my default self is really outgoing and definitely not used to acting this way This has got me very depressed.
But yeah, In a moment of distress i ended up feeling my neck muscles and discovered that the pain that i thought was coming from inside of my throat, was coming from outside of my throat, the muscles on the right side of my throat were all tensed and strained. I spent a night massaging them so that they would free up. And I discovered that there is blatantly less muscle on my right side then my left. The massage definitely helped with the pain, though its not gone completely, but I'm pretty sure my symptoms would still be degenerating much more than if i didn't discover that.
Also I've looked on the web and maybe an MRI would be able to give me an actually accurate diagnosis? I don't know though.

But yeah, I'm feeling pretty hopeless at the state of my voice, whenever I go to my parents they get angry at me and say its in my head, even though the doctor saw that the muscles on my right side inside of my throat have limited range of motion and loss of speed compared to my left  side. (i only know this cause i went to see another doctor and he showed me the notes the laryngologist wrote, i wasn't told this. He said to me when I asked him about it that the muscles looked symmetrical) And I mean, if my muscle is strained and weakened so badly that I can't even swallow correctly, how am i going to ever recover? I feel pretty alone right now cause I don't really have any help with this. And I can't really go and hang out with friends or anything cause i can't talk for that long.

I'm on here cause maybe someone will know something about muscles or something, and maybe I'll find out that i can get better, cause I really hate this, I hate not being able to fend for myself or take care of the things I need to take care of, cause I need my voice to do them... And also that I'm completely by myself on this issue. I'm open to pretty much any help I can get. Cause dang, I need my voice back.

Thanks in advance.

[philnoir]

Well, what's done is done. Take your vow of silence and heal.

All will be fine in the future. The human body has an amazing capacity to heal.

Be well.

[Kthenwhy]

Thanks for the reply!

Yeah what I'm worried about is i sang in the car every day (until the swallowing difficulties, which was a week after the nov 15th party) despite the pain. I was going through a lot of stressful stuff other than my throat/laryngeal pain. And that scares me cause that means i was re-injuring it every day, which is a very stupid thing to do. Normally I'm very meticulous about this stuff, which really frustrates me cause this is a huge problem... And now I can't swallow or talk right. When looking at the video of my vocal cords in action my right side is like, dumb compared to the left. Its slower and weaker, less responsive. (The opening and closing, not the vocal cord, my cords are fine) ';m really worried that I can't recover due to like, built up scar tissue from the injuries or something. :(

[philnoir]

Yes, reflux can damage the vocal cords. Good point.

[Drf0001]

I was having swelling in my neck years ago.and I also was having trouble talking.I saw my ENT and he said my larynx was in bad shape due to acid reflux.and that I need surgery to fix it so that the acid reflux could not do anymore damage than it had already done.I had the surgery this was back in 1995 so I think these days they can do it via endoscopic,which will be much easier on you.I believe the procedure was a Nissamindemnification.I may have spelled that wrong but it should lead you in the right direction. Good Luck. Drf0001

[philnoir]

It's not in your head, but that's close -- it's in your neck.

You've strained your larynx, which is a kind of box, open a both ends, filled with vertical bands of smooth muscle fiber.

Anatomy of the neck is very complex and is a specialty of its own. I'm not surprised your speech therapist did not know the names of these muscles -- that's not their domain. If interested, you can find a good description of the neck and larynx in Wikipedia -- I just confirmed this.

You can't go to parties and shout. By all means, cut out any smoking.

Like any injured tissue, they need rest. You've got to keep your voice down, and follow the exercises given by the coach. Work together and tell the coach what works and what doesn't.

And no smoking -- stay away from environments that are smokey.

Sometimes the cords develop small nodules from overuse. The muscles themselves are subject to spasm. This will pass with rest.

You'll be fine -- you just need to be patient and rest your vocal cords. As TR would advise, talk softly but carry a big stick.

Best wishes.