Muscle Pain/Joint Pain/Tingling

[brooke131]

I'm a 22 year old female, who for the past 3 months has been having various health problems.  In June of this year I kept getting bladder infections and was eventually told by a urologist that I had interstitial cystitis.  The urologist put me on a lot of medication and nothing seemed to help.  In July I started to develop serious joint pain in my knees, fingers, ankles, and elbows.  By August the pain continued to spread into my muscles and more joints.  Now, I'm having pain in my shoulder and even in my jaw which continues to lock up.  Occassionally I'll have very brief tinglining in my hands or feet or numbness in my pinky finger which is followed by more pain.  The tingling/numbness lasts for only a few seconds or minutes.  The pain continually moves around my body and I've experienced it regularly in both arms, both legs, back, and neck although it tends to favor my right side.  I've also noticed that some of my muscles have started twitching slightly- my eyelid and some muscles in my legs.  It's not painful or noticable to anyone watching- just very frightening. I've also started getting some rashes on my face and upper chest that will be there for a few hours and then go away as quickly as they appeared.

The pain seems the worst in the mornings when I get out of bed and I almost seem stiff- making getting ready for work difficult.  The stiffness seems to ease up throughout the day but will flare up again at night around 7:00.  Changes in temperature or weather also seem to make the symptoms worse.  

I've never had any health problems before and nothing like this has ever happened to anyone in my family.  I was absolutely terrified that I might have ms, but my doctor thinks that that is unlikely.  He's currently running blood tests, but can't find any inflammation- however he says that inflammation may take awhile to show up.  Does anyone have any suggestions as to what this might be?  I'm really frightened and would be grateful for any help!  Thank you!

[brooke131]

Thanks for your response!  They've checked my thyroid and have said it's normal.  They've also checked RA and ESR in early August but are checking again.  No one in my family has ever had Rheumatoid Arthritis.  The did a complete blood panel and said the only thing that was off was my eosiniphils which looked high but could be attributed to many things and my calcium which was low.

[DrKalraMD]

Hi, possibly it is autoimmune disorder and is being investigated. Blood tests like ANA, ANCA, ESR, RA factor etc are done for diagnosis. Do you have family history of Rheumatoid arthritis?

Also important is to investigate thyroid status.