I had mentioned this a few weeks ago. I have usually a sore neck and shoulder muscles if I have tried to strain to be heard for a period of time (tends to put a damper on socializing) I also at times suffer from a headache. When all this started over the summer when my voice starting the crackling after a long day at work I would come home with migraine or would suffer later. Of course at the time it was hard to figure what to attribute it all to, at the time due all the hours I thought it was stress at work. Well, know that I have no voice and have been out of work for six months, I find that it comes from trying to talk for excessive periods of time or being put in difficult situations.Just thought I add my two cents.
Jean
Oh, Im sorry I guess I do have a voice, if you call a whispering a voice, if you call loosing a word no and then a voice. It has been labeled dysphonia, spasmodic (that's how my doc wrote it). The neck pain is progressing, so Im going for MRI.I thought was on the right bulletin board for SD, so I have no voice sort a speak like some of you. Im AB/sd.
I would one day like to wake up and find out this was all a horrible mistake, and that I can talk again my voice is back and I dont have to keep apologizing while Im talking to people, asking if they can hear me and so forth. That we can figure if there is correlation between the headaches, neck pain and shoulder pain other than arthritis, and so forth. That I wasn't short of breath at times and just have everything back before September.
Jean
Jean,
When you said you had no voice, I thought maybe you'd recently had surgery or a Botox injection. My friend is AB/SD and lost her voice for six months after a botox injection. She has since recovered from the Botox but talks with a whisper of a voice and sometimes has no voice. I think your on the right bulletin board.I'd like to wake up from this nightmare too. I'd like my boyfriend, children and grandchildren to hear "my" voice. They never have. I still have faith that some day they will.
I have pain in my shoulders too. One of my doctor's said it's because I press my head and shoulder area together when I talk. Maybe she's right.
I hope better days are ahead for you and all of us who suffer with this.
Cindy (AD Northeast Kansas)
Hey, you guy's let's face it having SD (Spasmodic Dysphonia) hurts mentally and physcially.I feel the pain you all are feeling and the flustration. Believe me I know, I've been there and was there for 17 + years. Thank God and science that I am now able to talk mostly normal because of a couple of fine doctor's and a surgery called, "Selective Adductor Laryngeal Deinnervation-Reinnervation". I am one of the fortunate and blessed who was given a second change.
However, the subject at hand is not at all related to my surgery and my good fortune. Headaches is also a serious hurtful problem. I know cause I suffer from them all the time and quite often they are migraines. Headaches are no laughing matter and should be checked out because they could be caused my a number of things.
Stress, muscle tension, having to force a voice out causes strain and tight muscles therefore causing numerbous problems such as MTD (Muscle Tension Dysphonia), TMJ, tension headaches, etc. I too think if this problem presist DO NOT HESITATE to seek out another opinion. Also certain types of medications, usually 80 - 90% can cause headaches. Being under constant stress causes headaches. And SD is definutely a stresser and a depresser. I sometimes have to take a medication called Imetrex for my migraines/headaches. The brain is an amazing thing and there are all types of headaches a person can and does have. Some are called Tension Headaches, others Mirgraines or cluster type headaches and it does sometimes take a neurologist/tests to determine the cause.
So, Please do get another opinion if the problem presist.
Regards and God Bless. Jan Joiner - Alabama - SLAD'R Surgery 6/01
I have thought the same things many, many times... that I'd like my husband, son and friends to be able to hear MY voice... the one I learned to identify myself with and relate to. We all grow up with a certain "body image", and SD has distorted it for each of us.I've had muscle tension headaches and body aches throughout the 28-29 years I've dealt with SD, although it was worse in the earlier years. A very good speech pathologist I went to at that time decided that even though we'd had limited success helping my voice, we could work to get rid of a lot of the additional and unnecessary facial, neck and diaphragmatic muscle movements I made as I strained to speak. To this day I swear that it's the most important thing I gained from speech therapy.
From what I've heard, it sounds like alot of people with SD also have other types of dystonia, and that presents it's own problems. But, for those of us who suffer from plain old muscular tension related to our SD:
I have a little theory about muscle movement and tension in dystonia patients... it's my own personal theory, as far as I know there are no medical studies to support this, I'm not a doctor... but I do have a rudimentary understanding of physiology. Here goes:
muscles get several signals in order to work. They get a signal to contract, and then almost immediately get a signal to "relax". In lab experiments a muscle can be forced into tetany (a cramping spasm) by exciting the fibers to contract so rapidly (over and over) that the muscle fibers don't have a chance to relax between each contraction. It just builds and builds. Here's my idea. When SD'ers speak, we use additional muscles (face, neck, diaphragm) that the human body doesn't ordinarily require (at least in the degree that we use them) for the task of speaking. All this muscular workout doesn't cause tetany, but we do tax these muscles; they aren't used to working so hard, the tension slowly builds up until it would take a gargantuan effort to be able to relax them... there have been many times that I've had to "sleep it off" just to be able to dissipate the tension that has built up during the day. And my own personal guess is that when they figure out what causes SD, it may be that it has something to do with the muscle signaling being out of whack, although why it only affects certain muscles is beyond me.
I would like to read what other people think about this, and how it may or may not relate to you personally. I've also wondered what other SD'ers "sense" is the cause of SD.
Funny you should mention that this week. Normally, I do not get headaches from speaking. However, last week I had to teach 3 classes in a row (I'm a trainer), which ended up having me speaking almost non-stop for 6 hours. At the end of the day, I had a pounding headache. This was quite unusual for me, as I don't normally have headaches that last for any length of time (except for sinus headaches during the change of season, but that's different). I was wondering if it could be related to the SD, as I'm overdue for my BOTOX shot. Luckily, it was gone in the morning and I was able to teach the rest of the week (same amount of time) without any problem.About the only other time I get headaches which I think might be SD related are if I have to talk a lot just after getting the BOTOX shot.
-Karen (AD/SD)