Just nearing the second week of my second round of Bell's Palsy . The first time happened during my third trimester of pregnancy with ds. This time, after a fun but exhausting visit home for the holidays. As I caught it much, much earlier this time I have not gone on to have complete paralysis and wanted to share the early warning signs and treatment to maybe help others prevent total (hopefully temporary) facial paralysis.
My first episode began with the feeling that I had burned my tongue, even though I had no memory of drinking anything hot. This went on for two days before I started losing control of the right side of my face. By the morning of the fourth day I had complete paralysis of the right side although with no drooping. I had recognized what was going on as the paralysis started to affect my mouth the morning of the third day and began treatment immediately. It took two weeks before any sign of recovery and six months to completely regain my smile.
This time, I noticed a tinging feeling in the lower portion of my face, such as when you are about to get a fever blister/cold sore (the syndrome is caused by the same virus - herpes simplex). I did not get suspicious until I noticed the tingling had traveled up my face and there was an underlying numbness. This time I immediately started treatment. I am now on day 10 with only a very small weakness in my smile on the right side. If I smile not showing teeth it does not even show. I can't tell you what a huge relief it is not to have total paralysis. But, I have had to constantly watch and monitor my treatment, making small adjustments along the way as tingling, twitching, numbness, and paresis of my mouth and eye muscles transpired.
The typical treatment plan is 2000 mg of acyclovir for 10 days and a six day course of steroids. On the seventh day my symptoms actually increased and I began another course of steroids which helped tremendously. I also added B12 injections on the fourth day as symptoms sharply increased on that day as well. These are given every other day. I have been extremely lucky that my brother is a physician and has assisted me and supported me in early treatment as well as changes that I have made along the way. On the days that I had a noticeable increase in symptoms I also added one more acyclovir tab for a total of 2400 mg/day instead of the recommended 2000 mg. New symptoms would begin to dissipate within hours.
I know this is somewhat lengthy but I feel if it helps even one person avoid a bout of facial paralysis it is worth reading!