Numb mouth and loss of taste

[YukonArthur]

Hey all,

I'm wondering if any of you can offer me some advice.

I've developed some numbness in my mouth and have lost my ability to taste. It is focused primarily on the right side and includes the inside of my cheek, my gums, teeth and half my tongue. It feels like I have had some dental freezing.
I haven't lost any mobility in my tongue so it seems to be only affecting my sensation of feeling and taste.

Has anyone else experienced something like this and do you know if there is anything I can do?
I haven't contacted my Neuro yet and I can't get in to see my family doctor for awhile.

I am a chef, and though I don't cook professionally anymore, I am a foodie and can't bear the thought that I have lost my ability to taste food. Gah.... frustrating.

Thanks for any advice that is given.

Cheers,

Arthur

[als5445]

Ive experienced this once. Contact your neuro. It went away as soon as I got steroids.

[rdmc]

One of my first symptoms (and constant friend) has been left sided tongue and facial problems.

If you drew a line down my the middle of my tongue, the left side is the side that's affected. It goes from being numb (like deader than a doornail) to being tingly or burning, to imparing my speech so I sound drunk.

At some level those symptoms are always there, but I've had them so long they're sort of low in my conscienceness.

There are meds you can try. Neurontin and Tegretol may help w/any sensory symptoms. I've found the best med for me is Klonopin .25 mg. If you look up Burning Mouth Syndrome (which isn't MS related, but is a nerve impairment to the tongue/mouth) you'll find that Yale researches found that Klonopin, in a small dose, was the best med for controlling the sensations of that syndrome. I've found that it works well for MS tongue related problems as well.

As to the taste buds, if I put something on the left side of my tongue, I don't taste it, but I do taste and my neuro said that's because we have identical taste buds on either side of our tongue. Although the left side taste buds are impaired the right side taste buds are working fine. I guess I used to notice things didn't have quite the zing as they had before, but on the upside, I can eat spicier things without as much of a burn

The good news is for most folks these symptoms are temporary or tend to come and go. If you'll use the search engine at the top and do an advanced search for the word "tongue" in thread titles you'll come up with lots of posts from people with the same problem who've had it completely disappear. (I'm the odd man out in this regard, guess I won the MS symptom lottery in the tongue department, LOL.)

I hope you get full relief from this soon...call your neuro and report it though, and maybe he can suggest a med to deal with it.

[doggiemom]

I've developed some numbness in my mouth and have lost my ability to taste. It is focused primarily on the right side and includes the inside of my cheek, my gums, teeth and half my tongue. It feels like I have had some dental freezing.
I haven't lost any mobility in my tongue so it seems to be only affecting my sensation of feeling and taste.

That was my first symptom i had the exact experience you describe, the right side of my face was numb like right down the middle of my tongue all the way up to my ear.

I had a course of IV Steroids and feeling eventually came back however i have a "permanent" feeling of like a burnt tongue and i can't stand anything spicy now. Mild salsa is like burning hot to me now.

I hope you can call your neuro and get in faster at least a course of steroids.

-R

[CrazyCatLady]

Ive experienced this once. Contact your neuro. It went away as soon as I got steroids.

Me too.

[twisterred]

I've had that symptom twice or so.
Strangest thing, isn't it?

Like others, steroids helped my body stop attacking myself.
Doc prescribed 5 days of IV steroids.
It worked.

[lauren614]

I also had this!

I suspect this was my first relapse 3 years ago. I had a migraine and woke up the next day with left-sided facial numbness and no taste. It lasted for 2 weeks. Such a weird feeling!