My accident was in 1966, before anything about AD was known. I was lucky, I had an alcohol block done on my spine, something that is not done today, but I have lived a life without spasms. When I get AD, it is not severe. After a bowel or bladder incident, I can usually start to feel it coming on with slight sweats, lightheadedness and just a yucky feeling. It will usually cause my blood pressure to be very high, ex: 240/130 one minute and two minutes later it may tank to 80/50. It doesn't do a whole lot for the system. I was always hesitant about taking something to lower my blood pressure, because my blood pressure would go low on its own, and who knows what would've happened. Specialists tried numerous times to determine the problem and how to treat it, but no luck. Then in May of 2010 it hit me worse than any time in my life. I had to call an ambulance for the first time as I thought I was having a heart attack. After two days in the hospital it was determined that my heart was good, the only thing they could determine was that, "we don't know." I had recently been under a doctor's care for Pseudomonas, but the infectious disease doctor did not want to treat me, he stated that the body can handle it better by itself. He was right! Unfortunately, after the family doctor found I had Pseudomonas, I tried a silver catheter, which irritated the bladder, causing the bladder to go into spasms. In my opinion this is what set off my AD. My AD usually takes about three to four weeks to run its course. The high blood pressure/low blood pressure scenario keeps going and gradually fades away. Years ago I visited an internist after one of my AD episodes and at that point he had no answers. I was very impressed with him however. The man definitely knew nerves of the body and how they worked. He had a small tool that looked like a cowboy spur, and as he moved it along my hands and arms, he told me where I should be feeling the pain and where I should not be feeling the pain. He was exactly right on, he knew exactly which nerves did what. Well in 2010, after I got out of of the hospital, I went to visit him while still having symptoms. Once again he had no idea, he listens to me, looked at all the tests that were taken at the hospital, "I just don't know." In one of those times I call "God moments" he said that a thought just came to him. He wanted me to try a medicine that was used, mostly by females when they get a urinary infection. He put me on phenzazopyridine 200 mg to deaden pain in bladder that may be causing bp spikes. Started med Saturday-Tuesday (3 days) and Mon. & Tue. almost no low bp, still some highs although not as many. In another day or two it was cleared out and I was pretty much back to normal. I visited my family doctor, he said that it is no more than an anesthetic, it will hurt to take it for a while. I stayed on the medicine for about five days, "worked for me." I'm not saying that this will work for everyone, but it cannot hurt to try. One caution: it makes you pee red. This is one medicine that is in my medicine cabinet. Good luck, Glenn Henry
