Hi!
I know this may sound ridiculous, but I'm quite scared that I have lympoma right now.
Some facts: 18 years old, 180cm tall, 70kg, male, never did drugs, never smoked, I barely drink (The most I ever drunk should be about 2 beers in an evening, or the equivalent in other alcohols.), had mononucleosis for a year when I was 12.
Basically, what is making me worried is some kind of dull ache in the top left part of each side of my head (If you take both sides of the head, and take the ear as the middle of four quadrants, the top left quadrant is where the pain is located). I've first felt it when landing in a plane. I sometimes get some pressure & pain on my ears during a landing, which is completely normal, but two weeks ago it felt really painful and uncomfortable in that area - Not the ears. Didn't even have a lot of pressure on my ears.
Then, a week ago, I drunk one beer at a party, and not long after I felt a very similar pain the the same area. When palpating the area, it also felt as if it was quite swollen - As if there was a bone going from my ears to the top-behind side of head on both sides. It wasn't as if touching the area would increase the pain or anything, but there just was this dull aching in that area.
After sleeping one night, the pain and swelling nearly went away (It took a few more days for the pain to completely subside, and I can't say a 100% how swollen it really was - I've never palpated my head in that area when it didn't hurt, so I don't really "remember" it's "normal shape".). Yesterday, I once again drank a tiny bit of alcohol (Not more than 1cl of beer), and about 20 minutes later, I got the same pain in the same area once again. Since this kind of worried me I tried to look it up online, and found multiple websites saying that "alcohol pain" is a rare symptom, but one that is pretty decisive of lymphoma... Which is why I am so worried.
The area there still hurts a bit right now, but here are the other symptoms, if I were to take wikipedia and other websites as a source:
- Lymph nodes swollen: I honestly don't know if that area contains a lymph node or not, but there are lymph nodes that are called retroauriculares that are just right below that area. And as I said, it felt as if that area was swollen.
- Itchy skin: No.
- Night sweat: Yes - Albeit that could be because I live in southern France and it currently is very hot.
- Weight loss: No.
- Pain following alcohol consumption: Well, apparently, yes - Which is what worries me the most.
- Back pain: Not really. I do have a bit of back pain, but I've had that since a long time and it's probably just due to the fact that I barely did any sports during puberty.
- Something about cyclical fever and EppsteinBarr: I don't know about the fever, but I've had had the Epstein-Barr virus for a year when I was twelve (Mononucleosis).
- Feeling tired, uncomfortable, dizzy, ... : Well, yes, but I'm not sure whether that's just due to me being anxious right now...
In short, that pain in the back of my head, coupled with what I read on multiple websites and other "symptoms" is making me really, really, really worried right now. Is there anything I can do to be certain that I'm healthy without having to run big scans at the hospital?
Thank you very much.
Reply With Quote
