Hi. I'm a 44 year old female suffering from prolonged facial numbness for over 3 1/2 years now. I’ve gone for a full blood analysis along with MRI of the brain and neck scan TWICE. My neurologist reckons that my condition is psychosomatic. I know my condition is REAL, and it’s definitely NOT psychosomatic. I wish someone tell me if my condition can progress into some life threatening condition.

I experience persistent facial numbness (right side) that radiates down my right arm up to the elbow. The severity of the numbness worsen whenever I’m under tremendous stress, but it never goes away even in times when I’m “stress-free”.

My neck scan showed that I suffer marked cervical spasm and early cervical spondylosis. C3/4 mild postero-central disc protrusion mildly indenting the thecal sac. Mild dessication of all cervical discs. No root foraminal narrowing seen. My Question : Could this be partly contributing to my persistent numbness?

My brain MRI reported multiple T2 and FLAIR hyperintense spots in the white matter of frontal & temporal lobes bilaterally. Midline brain structure, basal cisterns and cortical sulci are normal. Non-specific findings of white matter hyperintense spots may represent ischemic foci or DEMYELINATION. No acute infarction seen. No evidence of mass. My Question : Could demyelination disease be contributing to my numbness as well?

My bloodworks results is as below:
AntiNuclear Antibody (ANA) exhibits CENTROMERE pattern, with a titre of 2,560.
ds-DNA antibodies titre is negative at 0.46 IU/mL.
Anti-neutrophil cytoplasmic antibodies C-ANCA and P-ANCA are both negative.
Lupus anti-coagulant time is 33.33 sec (control time 30.5 sec), Russell viper venom 1.1, and Lupus anti-coagulant is negative.
Complement C3 and C4 are normal with a reading of 1.11g/L and 0.31g/L respectively.
Extractable Nuclear Ag including SS-A (Ro), SS-B (La), RNP, Sm, Scl-70, Jo-1 are all negative.

I was diagnosed with Hashimoto’s many years back but my TSH, T3, T4 readings are under control now with 75mg Oroxine (levothyroxine) daily. My Question : Could my elevated ANA be due to my pre-existing Hashimoto’s? Could it be an indication of some auto-immune disorder that contribute to demyelination and my numbness? My neurologist couldn’t explain the highly elevated readings or link it to my numbness.

My neurologist couldn’t find any link of my facial and arm numbness to the reports above. Her diagnosis of the facial numbness : PSYCHOSOMATIC.

Can someone please help me understand what I’m suffering from?

Thanks.
LK