eight months in, my neuro ran the full panel. MRI clean, spinal tap clean, metabolic work - all clean. by that point the pa had already said it was stress, my pcp said anxiety… so clean results should have been good news.
except I was on the floor three days a week. the clean results made it worse, because then the message shifts: if tests are normal, the problem must be pacing. must be anxiety you’re not managing. must be psychological.
and I know pacing - i taught it for years. i track activity, rest proactively, stop before the crash. but knowing the rule doesn’t protect you. eighteen months in, i log flares and what sets them off in careclinic so i can show my doctor a real pattern instead of just saying i feel worse.
and the logs show something the tests don’t: some crashes are predictable. some sneak in on weeks where everything looked right. the tests don’t explain that. so how do you trust your body when everything that’s supposed to measure it comes back clean?