I have read that people contracted GBS from the flu shot and certain viruses. I amm curious how everyone on this site contracted GBS…thanks!
Flu shot likely cause.
I have no idea. I had a sinus infection about a week before and I was diagnosed with pneumonia in the hospital. No vaccinations no known viral infections.
I got GBS from Metformin ( I have diabetes II)
Tdap vaccine
I got if after a stomach "bug" that no one could nail down. I gradually morphed from feeling nauseated all the time to having trouble walking. We never did figure out the first thing, but telling the whole story to my 1st neurologist gave him the info he needed to make the original diagnosis.
I did not experience any noticeable illness prior to the onset of my symptoms. I had attended a camp with about 500 other teens 3 weeks before. My neurologist said that it was most likely a virus that I had picked up while there.
I did get it from the flu shot, though that is supposed to be a rare incident. The actual flu, stomach/intestinal viruses, post-shingles, Epstein-Barr are some other ways. The Mayo Clinic site has some very good information on it as far as risk factors for GBS, so if you haven't checked it out it's a worth-while read. The CDC site also has some good information.
Hope you are doing okay,
Gina
I got it from pneumonia, I am 3 months in to it now.
Some kind of cold right before GBS appeared.
Symptoms were only a sore throat and fatigue for a week and then one day I could barely walk ( the GBS circus had come to town ). Funny thing was I was getting decent rest during the cold and not pushing myself in any way.
I had a common cold with simple annoying congestion, runny nose, and a little cough starting. Never even had a fever but went to the doctor and was told i had an upper respiratory infection. Went home and laid down for an hour then i got up to go to the bathroom and collapsed. Shorly thereafter i was in icu and paralyzed from the neck down. After 65 days in the hospital here i am, a member of a gbs support group. My neurologist in the hospital told me that a common denominator is that patients generally waited to long to originally get medical attention for cold or flu symptoms. Once the paralyzation starts the original virus has already been killed by the immune system and has moved on to the nerves. Wether he is accurate or not, i do not know.
I remember having a bad cold and then right after that I came down with sinus infection. I doubt it was the flu shot I had 6 months prior to coming down with GBS.
My first symptom was numbness in my fingers. After two days of that, I started to think I was getting the flu. The weakness and exhaustion worsened over the next two days. I went to the doctor and was told I had the flu. Go home, keep pushing fluids and rest. I hadn't left the couch for five days. Two days later I was in ICU completely paralyzed and on a ventilator. My neurologist back then told me there was nothing I could have done. When the first sign of numbness appeared my body had already turned on itself, no amount of medical attention was going to change that. And since every single case is unique because every person's body reacts differently you just do the best you can to stop the progression and begin the recovery.
I saw a funny meme today that said " autoimmune disease, because the only one tough enough to kick my ass is me!" So true! Anyone battling GBS has to be hardcore, bad to the bone tough. Keep fighting
My daughter got GBS after eating chicken infected with campylobacter. She is still paralayzed after 14 months.
I am sorry…I have read that undercooked chicken can cause GBS.
Charlotte said:
My first symptom was numbness in my fingers. After two days of that, I started to think I was getting the flu. The weakness and exhaustion worsened over the next two days. I went to the doctor and was told I had the flu. Go home, keep pushing fluids and rest. I hadn't left the couch for five days. Two days later I was in ICU completely paralyzed and on a ventilator. My neurologist back then told me there was nothing I could have done. When the first sign of numbness appeared my body had already turned on itself, no amount of medical attention was going to change that. And since every single case is unique because every person's body reacts differently you just do the best you can to stop the progression and begin the recovery.
I saw a funny meme today that said " autoimmune disease, because the only one tough enough to kick my ass is me!" So true! Anyone battling GBS has to be hardcore, bad to the bone tough. Keep fighting
I like that quote; I think I'll borrow that.
Exactly 2 weeks before developing my GBS symptoms of double vision, weakness in my hands and a few hours later an inability to raise myself from bed, I had suffered the most severe case of gastro imaginable, and as we all know now, this is one of the classic pre-cursors of GBS.
At first I put the gastro down to food poisoning from some home-made beef tacos, but as my wife also had them, (and continued to clean up the rest of the mince and salad the next day), I dismissed that as the cause, however I suppose if a bug was on just one lettuce leaf that I managed to get, well......
I then went over what I had exposed myself to that my wife hadn't, and it came down to either picking up a soil based bug whilst out using my metal detector in a park or cleaning out a water tank in which a frog or cane-toad had died and rotted and turned the water rancid. Both these activities of mine were in the day before I got gastro.
I lean towards the latter as the tank had, using a phrase from the movie Kenny, a smell that will outlast religion.
Mine was definitely from the flu shot. I noticed symptoms just 1 week after getting the flu shot, tingling hands and feet. That was in 11/9/13 and I am starting my 3rd year of recovery. I still have bad days but a lot more good ones. Having GBS is definitely not for the faint of heart. They didn't figure out what I had for 5 weeks
They had no idea. I was in one hospital then transferred to Yale. I worked in dialysis & they said I probably got it there somehow but haven’t a clue.
I had eye infection that lingered and finally turned into nasal infection. Lasted 2 weeks then woke up with numbness in hands and I went to the clinic on a Saturday morning. They prescribed antibiotics. I went home for 6 hours and progressively got worse and eventually went to Emergency room where they sent me back home late that night. 6 am the next morning I was on ambulance headed for another hospital and was intubated 8 hours later. Very fast moving Miller-Fisher variety for me and I got hit VERY hard with it, Also had spider bite the day before I went to hospital.