The CIDP/GBS Life

Figuring out that GBS was the problem took several months.  When my husband started having issues, we didn't know what was going on.   How it started Looking back, we think his disease was triggered when he had a bad virus of some kind.  My usually hard-working husband, the one who never took a day off, was too sick to go to work.  He had a severe headache and was running a fever over 101 for several days.  We thought it was just the flu or something and that he'd be better in a couple of days.   Was it a virus? When he didn't get better, we went to the emergency room.  The first time, they did a head CT, looking for meningitis and other stuff like that.  When it didn't show anything, they sent him home.   We went back a week later.  Same symptoms.  This time, they did nothing but watch him.  We're not entirely sure they believed he was still having problems.  After a few hours, they sent us home again. But he wasn't any better.  As a matter of fact, he was gett

  Do you know what GBS or CIDP are?  We didn't know either, until a couple of years ago. GBS, short for Guillain-Barre Syndrome, is a rare nerve disorder in which your body's immune system mistakenly attacks the peripheral nervous system, causing weakness, tingling, and paralysis to the extremities. CIDP, short for Chronic Inflammatory Demyelinating Polyradiculoneuropathy, is an autoimmune disease in which the body's immune system attackers the myelin sheath that surrounds nerves and assists in the transmission of signals.  CIDP is considered the chronic version of GBS.  GBS is 2-3 in 100,000 people.  CIDP is said to occur in 1.9 to 7.7 per 100,000 people. Either one is pretty rare, but my husband had GBS and then CIDP.  So I guess we hit the jackpot!   This has been quite the learning curve.  The doctors in our area took a while to recognize it because it's so rare.  But we're learning as we go.  That's what this blog is for; to share our experiences and maybe