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Swollen lymph nodes - extremely painful : Redux

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Akoto

Akoto

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Joined
Jan 9, 2005
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3,208
Location
Guelph, Ontario, Canada
I can feel the swelling in my teeth and neck and ears. I cant even open my mouth really. It literally feels like there's a small animal chewing at the inside of my neck. I cant talk, I cant swallow. It's really really horrible and I hope you guys can help me out.

Googling around and talking to people I've narrowed it down to a viral infection, which there is no fix for. If I went to the hospital I think I'd just be sitting there for 6-8 hours and walk away with a prescription for something useless. Every website just says to rest&relax and to tolerate the pain for up to 2 weeks, but it's to the point where I want to cry from the pain but can't because it hurts too much! The node itself isn't swollen past an inch(I don't think), nor is the skin red on the outside so I am "winning the battle".

I guess I was just looking for the kind of tips and tricks you wouldn't find on google or from a pharmacist. Since it's not a bacterial infection, gargling with salt water or mouthwash hasn't done anything but hurt (a lot).

I was told to eat aspirin, which isn't doing the trick anymore. Same goes for Ibuprofen. The codeine in T3's hasn't done much more than make me groggy and constipated.

Please halp!
 
One other symptom I didn't think much of, and which is becoming more evident, is a difficult time regulating my body temperature.

I fell asleep randomly in the middle of the day, and woke up drenched in sweat. I haven't been able to speak more than a couple words all day...think it could just be old fashioned strep throat?

* red and white patches in the throat
* difficulty swallowing
* tender or swollen glands (lymph nodes) in the neck
* red and enlarged tonsils
* headache
* lower stomach pain
* fever
* general discomfort, uneasiness, or ill feeling
* loss of appetite and nausea
* rash
I have all the symptoms in bold, but the catch is I cant open my mouth wide enough to see the back of my throat :P

Should I just stop being a baby and go to the damn hospital?
 
Actually, those are all symptoms I grabbed from a page I found on strep throat :). I only have the symptoms in bold and I had someone who knows what strep looks like to have a look and it seems I'm OK.

At this point I'm pretty darned sure its just a viral infection which lots of people in my area have right now, but its just affecting my neck a lot more for some reason. Really I feel pretty good otherwise and I think I just need to fight it off...

Your heatpad idea worked really well for the pain. Any other suggestions?
Also, which is better for my case: Ibuprofen or Acetaminophen (or both?)
 
Some bacterial infections cause swollen lymph nodes too, so it isn't necessarily viral. Have you had your vaccinations?
 
I'm in favor of seeing a Doctor. I have had good feed back on recommending astragalus to a friend who gets swollen lymph nodes every time she gets a virus. Anything that is severe and out of the ordinary warrants a trip to the Doctor or ER, especially if it doesn't seem to be resolving.

A great palliative for me is sedatives and NSAIDs, but you've already been doing that I think.
 
Thanks for all the advice. I'm going to wait it out for one more day (Advil is doing a much better job than Aspirin for whatever reason) and then call my doctor on Monday if I haven't noticed any significant improvements.

I think a big part of it is that I like to eat more or less constantly through the day, and since it's been such a chore I'm probably eating 1/4 that at the most. This explains all the restlessness, lack of sleep, and headaches.

I just read up on that astragalus stuff and I'm going to go pick some up this afternoon.
 
I don't mean to be the scary doomsayer, but you should really see your doc. Swollen lymph nodes can be as serious as lymphoma. :\
 
Yeahh...

Doing what I've been doing and following the advice of people here and the rest of the internet I've managed to improve my health to the point where I can open my jaw a bit wider and can speak again. Huzza! .... but at the back of my throat are big white stripes of pus and I still feel pretty much like shit.

That's definitely strep, right? A strep throat guide from the Mayo Clinic tells me that ear aches and jaw pain are a sure sign that to go see the doctor, so I'm going to call him first thing in the morning and hopefully be fixed and ready to go by the afternoon (yeah right).

I've put together a few pages to give to my doctor so I don't have to talk so much, including symptoms

- Chills/sweating, especially during sleep
- Jaw pain (can’t open wide)
- Ear pain (throbbing, comes and goes)
- All pain on the right side of jaw, and back of throat. No swelling, jaw pain, or ear pain on the left side.
- Swollen lymph nodes
- Pus in back of neck
- Stiff neck
- Difficulty swallowing anything, even saliva
- Saliva is thick and has a white residue
- Extremely sore throat/sometimes unbearable pain
- Other than these specific things and pain so great I can barely talk, I honestly feel pretty great otherwise. No headaches, no nausea, not even any real fatigue.

----------
, as well as self treatments, and duration/timeline (about a week).
 
If you aren't bothered by needles tell your Doc you'd rather have a shot then a round of oral antibiotics. My Doc was writing a script, I asked and he switched to a shot. Injections give relief within hours as opposed to days. Apparently some Docs get so much resistance from the folks scared of needles they do oral antibiotics by default. They may ask you to stick around the waiting room for an hour if you haven't been exposed to antibiotics much to make sure you don't go into anaphylaxis.

There are lots of potentially very serious complications from untreated strep and there isn't any alternative medicine approach with anywhere near the effectiveness of antibiotics. Doctor tomorrow or we will beam a medical team straight to your quarters and put you in the brig upon your recovery;)
 
It's good you are seeing a doctor! It seems pretty acute and you don't want the infection to go more out of control than it already is-- sometimes this can lead to rheumatic fevers and heart complications. And prolonged periods of non-use of things like marijuana.

While waiting for your appointment, gargle with warm water that has salt. Don't let anyone else use your utensils. Try eating soups and stay away from spicy food. :) Take care, and let us know how it goes.
 
Akoto said:
but at the back of my throat are big white stripes of pus and I still feel pretty much like shit.

That's definitely strep, right? A strep throat guide from the Mayo Clinic tells me that ear aches and jaw pain are a sure sign that to go see the doctor, so I'm going to call him first thing in the morning and hopefully be fixed and ready to go by the afternoon (yeah right).
Click to expand...

Yep, you are very correct. From my studies and from getting strep alll the time as a kid :\ strep throat (pharyngitis) is reeeeeeeally painful and I remember the doc feeling my lymph nodes for swelling. I remember it felt extremely painful when he pressed on them too. Strep throat should have you feeling like so much shit you can't move. You should also have a fever. My fever would shoot to 104 degrees F. My doc would tell my mom to feed me popsicles. Strep is no joke. It can kill you, and I feel for ya if that's what it is cuz I remember all those times just not being able to move.
 
^It's worth a shot, since I've been eating Vit-C alone anyway. I'll go pick up all these vitamins individually (and as high quality as I can find) as soon as the shops open up.

(I just got woken up by sweats, headache, and a fully re-inflamed throat)
 
Just went to see the doctor this morning and got a 5 day anti-biotic package for strep throat and maybe its just a placebo effect, but I feel better already! (She had never heard of the injection, and advised against it if it did exist, but she did offer the slightly more expensive 5 day alternative -Thanks Enki)

Thanks a lot for all the help everyone, it made a world of difference!
 
My nodes are swollen to the point where I can't even sleep, but I find getting a little drunk almost completely stops the pain. That's not really a long term solution, but on particularly bad nights it might help you.
 
ahhh, i'm right there with you akoto.

woke up some backaches and an earache yesterday. plus, i had some weird scalp pain. i had just gotten over the flu about 3 weeks ago (i'm in nursing school- i'm blaming that for all my recent illnesses!).

when i woke up today, i could barely talk. my throat felt nearly swollen shut! it's super super red! i went to see my dr., and she's not sure it's strep but put me on zithromax (z-pak) prophylactically (not always a fan of this, but anything to feel better right now).

although, i recently read that strep runs it's course in a few days, antibiotics only help to not make it contagious to others.

but again...placebo effect.

take care buddy!
 
Oh god it's happening again!!

This time it started out exactly like it was before, but then it moved to the left side (exclusively- last time was exclusively the right side) and now my left tonsil is very swollen, and is producing a fair amount of blood in my spit and lots of really thick nasty saliva. My breath also stinks to high hell.

I tried poking it with my toothbrush and it got blood all over.

Is this definitely linked to my problems before? Has my bad case of strep damaged my tonsils/throat so I'm more susceptible to these kind of infection? Z-pack fixed me right up last time, but I never completely got over the symptoms, in particular my jaw not being able to open all the way and persistent throbbing sensation in my ear.

I'm doing all the things I did before to help and it hasn't really gone down or done anything for two days. Definitely this time I wont wait so long before calling the Doc, but I'm wondering what help you guys can provide me (again)
 
did the doc culture for strep? Or was he a dumbass and just handed you antibiotics? Was he sure it's strep?

PS. Just a thought, but my ex-BF's doc told him he had strep and it turned out to be mononucleosis. Considering the length of your symptoms, maybe it's mono?
 
Actually I just found out 5 minutes ago the strep swab came back NEGATIVE

I have an appointment for thursday...is there any chance my neck is going to explode like an apendix before then? It's about twice as bad as it was last night and if I can get the afternoon off work I'm just going to go to the hospital.
 
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