I was diagnosed with shingles last July. I was 49. Prior to my diagnosis, I was having pain in my left ear and numbness and spasms along my jawline for about 3 weeks. I was also having headaches and felt queasy. I thought I had a sinus infection and went to a walk-in clinic and was told it was probably a dental problem and was given an antibiotic and told to see my dentist, which I did. He did not see anything wrong and sent me to the endodontist who did my root canal several months earlier, who also saw nothing wrong. I started to get tingling on my head on the left side about 3 weeks later and a rash appeared on the left side of my face and moved pretty quickly across my left forehead and into my eye. I was on an antiviral and also a gel for my eye for ten days. I was having stabbing pain behind my eye and on the left side of my head. It hurt to touch even one strand of my hair. This was the worse pain I ever had in my life. Pain meds really did not help. I did get some relief by putting ice packs on my head. I had the head pain for about 5 weeks and it got less intense after about the first week to ten days. I have still been having the burning pain in my ear and started having numbness along my jaw again and went to see an ear, nose and throat doctor 3 months ago.He put me on prednisone for ten days. It only helped a little. The doctor said that when I had shingles it was probably in my ear, too and I should have been on steroids along with the other meds I had been given at the time. I am also having some slight burning pain in my left eyelid. I also have some numbness along the left side of my tongue which affects my speech sometimes – Has anyone else experienced this? I am finding that this has been very frustrating for me and can’t seem to find the right medication to ease my symptoms of postherpetic neuralgia. From what I have read about shingles, if you have pain before the rash, you are more likely to have complications with PHN afterwards.

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