Tongue feels heavy - swallowing on one side feels off

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DrNilesCrane

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I’d like to start by admitting I have pretty bad health anxiety after going through a cancer scare last year where I spent months getting a lymph node checked and ultimately biopsied for it to turn out benign. I recently went through a pretty rough post viral fatigue that I’m finally coming out the other side of.

I’ve had a lot of twitches all over my body and last week I noticed it was a little difficult to swallow. I began compulsively checking if I could enunciate words, speak sentences, move my tongue around, manually swallow with force. I’ve been doing this every day. My tongue feels heavy and I noticed a slight pain under my chin on the left side. I recognize this is not a symptom of ALS.

In the last two days I noticed that when I swallow I feel like the left side of my throat doesn’t really feel like it’s swallowing the same as the right.

I want to say, the logical part of my brain says, hey dumb dumb obviously your tongue is heavy because you’ve been using it in an unnatural way 100x a day for the last week. But the anxious part of me can’t stop worrying. I’m working with a therapist on this. I’m sorry for yet another post but I am very worried. Thank you.
 
Hello-

Have you been to see a doctor about your concerns? This is where you must start if you think there are issues that need to be assessed for and addressed.

It sounds like you recognize your anxiety is playing a huge part here. What are you doing to address this? It can be absolutely debilitating. It can also create some obstacles for physicians to assess for other issues, as anxiety can amplify existing symptoms or even cause physical symptoms. I should note that although it might seem logical to you to go on to an ALS forum to seek reassurance from people with ALS about your worries, it is likely doing more harm than good. Compulsive reassurance seeking does not help, but getting to the root cause of anxiety and having a qualified person help you find some tools to address anxiety will.

Please visit with a doctor first if you have further questions. Your sense of heaviness and swallowing concerns sound more like hypervigilance than actual physical symptoms. Only a doctor can provide the kind of feedback you need for this.

Take care.
 
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