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Does stress affect your LEMS?
April is Stress Awareness Month.
If you’re pretty new to the Lambert-Eaton Myasthenic Syndrome community, you might not be aware that physical and mental stress can worsen your LEMS symptoms.
It seems the more you experience the ups and downs of LEMS symptoms, the more you begin to correlate the worse days to something specific. I’ll give two examples from my life, and see if you find anything similar in yours.
My LEMS symptoms get much worse in the high summer heat. It’s very noticeable, sometimes making it difficult for me to walk and pick up my mail. A neurologist explained to me that high heat stresses the entire body physically, including your respiratory and cardiac symptoms. That added stress load exacerbates LEMS.
The other for me is mental stress. Recently, I participated in a three-day MDA event and my LEMS symptoms flared almost immediately with weak hips and difficulty walking.
I attribute much of it to the mental stress of doing activities never done before, and constantly meeting and talking with others at the event, almost nonstop. It outwardly doesn’t feel like you’re being stressed, but the stress is there subconsciously.
Do you feel physical and mental stress plays a part in your day-to-day LEMS symptoms?
Do you have any strategies to help you manage stress?
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