Pains in left-side of body, persistent for many months. Please help on what to look into or seek out

Hello,

Apologies on the length of this, but really want to get this figured out.

Symptoms and overview:

Firstly, everything below is happening purely on left-side of my body (usually gets worse as the day progresses but can also ruin my whole day from the beginning).

For the past 7-8 years, I've gotten random piercing pains in my chest (very few and far in-between, like months apart, sometimes two consecutively and about 22 years in age). I smoked a lot of marijuana during this time period and also a smoker for same duration for various reasons and stupidity. It caused me to have some anxiety but was mostly manageable. Marijuana helped with a lot of stress and cigarettes were a bad habit that I picked up. But eventually, more often than not, it would start to make me feel tight/inflamed in my back and chest when I smoked marijuana.

I stopped smoking cigarettes about 1.5 years ago and started smoking an e-cig to fulfill the nicotine cravings.

I also substituted marijuana with delta 8. I smoked delta 8 for the past 1.5 years and have stopped completely for the past month.

Now, within the past few months, I've been getting a lot of scares. I had piercing pain and tightness in my chest and back. Along with a tightness in the armpit, arm, hamstring, calves, neck, and sole of foot. With the extremities, I also got some pins and needles and random numbness in the fingers and toes, especially within the last couple weeks. It got so bad a few months ago that I thought I was having a heart attack and called 911. This happened twice. Paramedics did an EKG and according to them, everything looked normal.

I sought out professional help with my physician; got lab tests done for thyroid, HIV/AIDs, other tests, a neurologist (did an EMG), got X-rays done on my whole spine. Everything was pretty okay, except for a few small things.

Lab Tests:

A little high cholesterol (almost borderline)

X-Rays:

slightly twisted T-spine and slightly compressed disc in L-Spine (lots of sitting in my life and not sitting in the best positions)

Neuro:

Everything seemed good

Physician recommended Etodolac (500 mg twice/day after eating for 10 days). I did the first round of this and within like 5-6 days, I felt better than I ever have in many years. This lasted for maybe 3 weeks. Then it all started shooting right back. I still had some pains during the 3 weeks of almost blissfulness, but also never felt this good.

My physician recommended a second round of Etodolac but those were on and off, good/bad days (mostly bad). After the second round, it just felt it it was getting worse and almost unbearable. Then I started feeling pressure on the left-side of my head, hip, left testicle (was randomly there too during the past few months; checked for any lumps and didn't find anything) along with all the other symptoms.

I believe because nothing was being found but I was still experiencing pain across my whole left-side, I started getting panic/anxiety attacks. My physician and some friends suggested that it may be anxiety (probably was getting them for many years but was able to mostly shrug them off). I started to do some meditation and some yoga within the past week, which helped quite a bit but the pains were still all there. I noticed that when I do start getting anxious, everything starts to flare-up. So, I kept consistent with the yoga, working out, and meditation to help alleviate this pain (which has mostly been working for a major part of the pain).

So, the final piece is this:

Although the days are more manageable with these consistent and proactive routines, I'm still getting these chest pains (not always but, especially when I make a movement or sometimes randomly, mainly when I'm sitting or laying down; BIGGEST CONCERN). I also still feel the pressure in my head, tightness and piercing/pins and needles in the foot, weakness and pressure in the hand and elbow, but not nearly as much in my neck and armpit (maybe fight or flight response from anxiety).

I'm seeking out anything to possibly look into to help with a diagnosis or if this truly is all anxiety and need to seek out professional help about this.

Please and thank you for any help.

Also, if any other information is needed, please let me know.

Much Appreciated,

Tyler

0 likes, 0 replies