Facing Reality : Children Can Also Suffer From Trigeminal Neuralgia

The three of us started our awareness campaign last December, not quite knowing exactly what we were doing or how to do it. But we just muddled along at first, then quickly realised that we needed a plan.

We wanted to create awareness, but we also wanted to have a place where people could find help and advice from fellow sufferers.

It was soon falling into place. We had a growing community of TN sufferers who were more than ready to help and support one another.

Living with this kind of pain gives you one thing. Empathy for other pain sufferers.

Sometimes it has been so emotional reading people’s stories. Reading of the years they’ve spent trying to get diagnosed. Reading of how living with the pain has taken their work, their relationships, their friends, sometimes their lives.

But there can be nothing more heartbreaking than one thing we discovered....the number of children who suffer from Trigeminal Neuralgia. That discovery has been shocking and has brought many tears. Yes, we had read that TN can affect children, but when you actually meet some of them, or their parents, it is truly heartbreaking.

That, more than anything, pushed us. We had to make our awareness campaign work. We had to be able to make people understand this condition. We had to let people know how important it is. We know we can’t make miracles happen. But without awareness, people will never know about it. And if it is not known about, there will never be hope.

And everyone needs hope.

Especially children.

A picture drawn by an eight year old child
when asked by his doctor to describe his pain.
This picture speaks a thousand words.