Hi Old Friends! I choked on thin air yesterday

[InvisibleTwitches]

Hey guys! Long time no talk.

I have a very quick question regarding a scare I had yesterday. I have typically been dealing with new scares by letting them run their course, and the result had been my best year with BFS in my life. But this one, well…..so I was at my desk at work, I stood up from my desk (I imagine I was about to talk to a coworker) and all of a sudden I COULD NOT BREATHE. It was as if I was asthmatic. I began to walk around in a panic, causing a scene as four to five coworkers ran towards me to see what was going on. I couldn’t breathe, my face became flushed, I begin to sweat and I was gasping for air. This lasted about 25 seconds until I was able to catch a breath. I told my coworkers I had choked on gum, which was a lie. I was simply choking on air, and had no idea how it happened…..and now, given my history and fear of ALS, I am FREAKING OUT that perhaps my tongue or throat muscles are now dying. This has never happened to me before and I am, for the first time in almost over a year, scared and concerned. Last night at dinner and now this morning, as I type, I feel like I am having trouble swallowing my food and last night, gargling my mouth wash…….

On a happy note, I had been doing very well dealing with my BFS. As healthy as I’ve been in years. I still get twitches everywhere, but they’ve drastically reduced with time, coinciding with my anxiety reducing. I’ve got a good job in the Bay Area and have spent the last two years working hard and saving up vacation days, then traveling around the world! BFS hasn’t held me back at all. And I am CERTAIN that I wouldn’t have made it through my darkest times of anxiety, at the height of my BFS and confusion about twitching, hot spots, tingling, sensory issues, you name it, convinced that I had ALS, if it wasn’t for the knowledge and support of this great community. I owe this community (and especially a handful of members) so very much, and I do promise to pay it forward and help with the knowledge I myself have gained (although visiting the forum today for the 1st time in over a year has shown me that I am still not ready yet…simply reading some of these posts sparks my anxiety and fear back up).

WHAT IS HAPPENING TO ME, GUYS!?

[Yuliasir]

probably asthma. It strikes some of us since it is believed to be a 'nervous' - related condition. My mother got asthma due to being uneasy about me for my 6 years of study (i was 1500 km from home).

Giving your history of ALS fers, please consider that ALS victims start to experience true lack of breath on the very late stages, when most of motor muscles are paralysed already, and if your episode should be due to deterioration of brainstem cells (which is a breathing center localisation and happens in bulbar onset), you would be dead for now and could not write that. Bulbar center failure never recovers. Since you had recovered in 25 secons (I could imagine how hard it was for you), the most probabale case is a kind of asthma.

[InvisibleTwitches]

Yuliasir, how are you, great to hear from you! I am not sure I ever told you this, but you were one of the key figures here in helping me escape my vast fear or ALS during the zenith of my anxiety.

So you truly believe that this is NOT related to ALS or onset of anything, as you stated, losing my breath like that OUT OF NOWHERE would come much later in the condition, a condition for which I don’t believe I have the early signs of? Although today I am having trouble swallowing, which is heightening my fear. Also, I’ve NEVER had asthma in my life, no record of it, and I’ve never, not once, experienced anything like I did yesterday. I called my parents for advice, and they thought that perhaps I inhaled too much air for some reason, unknowing, which caused the reaction. Still, I am alarmed and scared. Again, just trying to gargle water at my desk right now at work, and it is hurting my throat and I’ve been having weird reflexes all morning.

[Yuliasir]

That's all because you are fearing - I mean pain in the throat etc. Since you are still of our common type of nerve system structure, no wonder your mind tunrs back to ALS.

As far as I know and understand brainstem operation and course of ALS, it never starts like that.

Brainstem is relatively small, and if breathing centre is damaged, then breathing function is irreversibly down. Here only invasive forced vetilation probably keeps life for a while... That is why people die in rabies which is in fact incurable bulbar neuritis (encephalitis) - just becasue of lack of breathing function central control. So compare person in rabies and yourself - nothing similar.

If not brainstem failure, the other case is diaphragm paralysis - but it is also irrecoverable and usually evident on a late stage of disease.

Since you recovered and are only extremely frightened, I assume this was a temporary bronchospasm which could be casued by tons of reasons.
If your asthma is neurogenic, it could manifest sharply. Finally, your mood disorder had manifested in a second, maximum in few hours - and lasts already for many years...

Hope this attack would not be repeated (at least not in that way).

[InvisibleTwitches]

Thank you for the information, as always, Yuliasir!!

So, it sounds like this is NOT the onset of ALS, and that I should just move on (like all of my scares in the past)?

Have to admit, my ANXIETY is the highest it has been in OVER A YEAR! Throat hurts, that choking scare, worry of onset ALS, having trouble swallowing today, etc. etc.

[nickston]

I bet dollars to donuts that when you stood up, some saliva flew back into your throat (e.g., by inhaling) and caused a laryngeal spasm, which is a normal protective mechanism. It's happened to me a few times before. Nothing to be worried about. Everything since then is probably your anxiety kicking in and causing the symptoms.

[InvisibleTwitches]

Nickston,

I hope you are right! I've been a mess all day (and all yesterday after it happened). I am hoping that is exactly what happened, although I assumed perhaps I inhaled too much air and began to choke. Either way, I've been a mess and just had a ton of trouble eating my lunch and breakfast -- perhaps, as you stated, it is all anxiety causing these symptoms. And as Yuliasir said, ALS does NOT start like this. So hoping this is just simply one of those random things that happens once and goes away and is NOT sinister......

[InvisibleTwitches]

What should I do IF this happens again, out of the blue, FREAK OUT?

[Yuliasir]

Nope in no way. as it was not repeated in three days, it was surely an accident like Nickston describes.

[InvisibleTwitches]

Thank you, again, Yuliasir! You are always full of knowledge. I should just chalk this up to a ‘onetime thing,’ and move on. This, like some many other things that have happened during my anxiety of A*S, is new, and almost certainly unrelated. But due to my anxiety, whenever something new happens the anxiety hits me like a ton of bricks, always, “this is probably the start of my symptoms, this has to be the start, I am doomed,” etc. etc.

I know rationally, especially after the info you provided, that this almost certainly can’t be the case, because this type of symptom doesn’t hit until late stages, and I feel absolutely great otherwise. Yet, again, like when my eye first started to twitch, or sensory stuff first started, or the hotspots that never went away, and from the initial reading I did on AL*, I always assumed my symptoms were related. It could just be in my head at this point, and likely is, but I've had trouble swallowing ever since....

[InvisibleTwitches]

[guitarguy11]

Key word in what you copied and pasted is "leads to." Certainly *** leads to not being able to breathe, control saliva, etc. But those things generally happen late in the disease, after you have lost the ability to walk, type, speak, or something to that degree. It doesn't start that way. If it was affecting your breathing, you would need to be on a ventilator by now, or you would already be dead. You need to settle down. Remember anxiety can do all kinds of things to us. You may have been anxious about something at work or something else happening in your life and had a type of panic attack, or it could be asthma, or it could be just one of those weird things that the human body likes to do to us sometimes that no one can explain. Sometimes I choke on saliva out of nowhere. That does not mean I have ***. I think everyone does that from time to time. With anxiety disorders, you can be anxious about things and not even know it. I know that sounds strange, but it is true. Settle down. Don't google. Think as logically as possible. *** does not present this way and if you have had it for 4 or 5 years (which you haven't'), you would not be functioning the way you are.

[InvisibleTwitches]

Thank you for the logical reality check, guitarguy11.

I have to think about this rationally, as what happened the other day could have been caused by any number of things, almost all of which are innocent.

I've had these AL* fears for almost 5 years now, and every time I get hit with a new symptom that I've also read is a symptom of AL*, I freak out, even with my knowing that many of the symptoms I've experienced are NOT the same at all, and if they are, would ONLY present themselves in the very late stages. I need to remind myself of that. It has been 5 years and I am still alive and well. It is just this anxiety that keeps getting the best of me, everytime something new happens. Luckily this is the 1st new symptom where I thought, "MAYBE IT IS THE START OF ALS" in over a year.

Thanks again Guitarguy11

[guitarguy11]

Anytime and you're welcome. I find myself doing the same things sometimes. Part of what this and other forums like it are here for is to help pull each other back to reality. Take care and I hope you feel better soon.

[InvisibleTwitches]

Thanks again, crazy how anxiety works, huh? So, it has been a battle the past few days. I've related almost everything that has happened to me since as yet another "sign" that this may become the start of you know what. Despite my knowing with near certainty that it would NOT present this way, and everything else happening is probably directly a result of my anxiety. Like last night, my left foot had an unusual sensory issue all night after a 3 mile run, and I thought, "this coupled with almost choking on thin air the another day must be a sign that my muscles are going, that this is the start......"