Paresthesia bad enough to affect walking?

[hope32]

I'm just curious; my second major MS attack, I had paresthesia on the whole left side of my body. It lasted about 3 weeks and then cleared up (mostly, but my left side still goes numb easily, i.e. if I sleep on it, if I have pressure on my lap, etc.). It was bad enough that it affected my walking; like when you have a leg that "falls asleep' bad enough that it's hard to walk at first.

I mentioned this to my MS specialist (who I switched to about a year after that attack) and he thought it was unusual for paresthesia to be bad enough to affect walking and wondered if there had been something else going on as well that wasn't recognized at the time (since then I just saw a general neuro and didn't make it to an MS specialist till a few months later). I'm just curious if anyone else has had a similar experience, and if it's really that unusual for paresthesia to affect walking.

[MarkLavelle]

I have paresthesia all the time in my feet (and most of my skin), and it does indirectly affect my walking.

It's not the same as numbness, but the paresthesia 'masks' some of what I would normally be feeling. So when I'm walking on auto-pilot I miss some of the cues I would normally get from my feet and that can turn into stumbling or a little bit of a wobble. I would not call it 'hard to walk,' it's just that walking requires a little more attention that it used to.

I also have short bouts of spasticity (or maybe just intense cramps?) in random muscles in my feet that do make it hard to walk...

[KateA2]

Yes, I have constant burning, tingling, and numbness in my feet and legs to the mid-thigh. If i do not take neurontin I would not be able to stand for more than a few minutes ( too painful! ) the parasthesia and neural pain was so severe after my 1st major attack, I thought I would lose my mind! It was relentless. I am super thankful neurontin works well for me I have to be careful where I put my feet, but I get around well most days...I do limp from the pain at times, but not apparent mostly.

[Nabbosa]

wrong nerve signals

Paresthesia occurs because the nerve signals are messed up, so it can create trouble with walking. It can mean that the signals going back to your brain about where your body parts are in space (proprioception) are incorrect. It can affect balance because of that - and all of this can be found easily on sites like NMSS (or at least on the old site), so it shouldn't be hard for a neuro to believe it.

BUT it could be that your neuro was thinking that a bunch of symptoms together might indicate something else, so I don't want to make it sound like he doesn't know what he's doing.

[jjeich]

It causes trouble walking for me!

I was initially wrongly dx-ed twice with plantar fasciitis. To me, it feels like I am walking on broken glass when I first get up, and I walk like Frankenstein for the first 10-15 feet before my gait normalizes.

My feet always feel numb and tingly, and at the outer edges, I don't really feel them, which can lead to being wobby (as someone else described) or I may stumble before I catch myself.

So the parasthesia (now that we know what it is, and now that we know I have nerve damage because of it), does cause walking difficulties for me, and any kind of heel is OUT.

I have to wear sturdy shoes or pay the price!

[AriD]

I have parathesias in both legs especially in my feet which do seem to affect my walking. I have a swollen sensation ( they aren't swollen), tingling, toe spasms, and weird sensations of stepping on a coin or stone. I have to wear sneakers to feel my feet so I can be steadier when I walk. I trip often if I wear sandals, heels, etcetera Also I always have to look at the ground in front of me when I walk. Las time I looked up for more than a brief second, I fell into some shrubs. So, for me, the weird sensations definitely compound my balance and leg weakness issues.