Strange aching, sore spot deep in left side of neck/throat

I get the same feeling

Me too, I have the same problem!!! 

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This is so strange! I have these same issues and it's been driving me crazy. I'm having some anxiety that it may be cancer. I know it's been awhile but I hope that one of you will reply and let me know what you discovered. I'm calling my doctor tomorrow for a referral to an ENT doctor. I hope to get answers. Thank so much! Am so hope you are both doing well!

Did you ever find out what it is? Something out of joint perhaps? The same thing is happening to me only quite suddenly after twisting my neck.

I had this pain. Months later i was diagnosed with throat cancer

I am 53 and never had that pain on the left side next to my throat over the collarbone. It hurts very bad when I COUGH or bent over to pick something up. It feels like the size of a golfball (no lump) but only when I push my finger in. No pain when I swallow. Coughfing is the main problem. Again, left about one inche next to my throat over the collarbone. Hope we all find some help!!

I have this too. It's a sort of ache that goes up from the collar bone to under the left side of the chin. Can feel it all the time but it's worse when I turn my head to the left. Not found a lump but it feels like a gland is swollen. Due to see the doc tomorrow anyway re high calcium results in blood test. Praying it's not cancer. Will report back.

Just this past week I was at track practice and we were doing our sprinting exercises, when we got done my neck hurt badly and I probably pulled a muscle. But yesterday we didn't have practice yet and that pain came back but only on the right side of my face and neck. I have allergies when the weather changes so I took an ibuprofen an that helped for a little while but wore off after an hour or so. Later in the day I had track practice after practice was over my neck hurt even worse, I try to ignore it but when ever I eat or drink something it hurts. It just won't go away even with medication. But its a reaccuring pain in my lower right jaw and the right side of my neck. How do I make it stop? If I go to the doctor they will probably say the same thing they said to you.

I have had the same exact symptoms, in fact, I lost my voice for 3 months. The doctors have been of NO help, and yes, they seem to be on the bandwagon about silent reflux. I finally did Google "pain in the left side of neck" when another round of useless tests and unbelieving doctors kept calling it a "sore throat". It's NOT that at all. My pain is deep in the left side of my neck close to the thyroid and larnyx. What I found on Google was that it was called Thyrohyoid Muscle Syndrome. From one website. . . . "The thyrohyoid muscle is involved in swallowing and speaking by elevating the thyroid and pulling down the hyoid bone." In happenstance, I mentioned the pain and possible diagnosis to my new massage therapist and she knew what it was. She is now doing deep tissue massaging my neck, face, forehead, shoulders, sternum, and scapula areas. Within 15 min of the initial massage, I had my voice back. The muscles and tendons were so tight that it was strangling my vocal cords. The thyrohyoid muscle/ligament is so deep that it takes some loosening of the surrounding muscles before she can massage the thyrohyoid muscle. The pain upon swallowing is only on the "up swallow", not the down swallow. The hyoid bone clicks (as does my larnyx), but the hyoid shouldn't do that. The thyrohyoid muscle is what is used when up-swallowing. It is better in the morning, but after a day of swallowing and talking and using it as normal, it becomes painful at night. When I lay down, I find that after an hour or so, it has relaxed enough to lessen the pain and deep ache. By the way, the doctors thought I had Grave's disease, as mentioned by another reply here, because a CAT scan showed my eyes bulging. That was not the cause, my thyroid is fine. The massage therapist said that when her face is stressed her eyes 'bulge' too. She massaged my face and eye area and within 2 days of the initial massage, the bulging had disappeared. I was so depressed before I found a good massage therapist who could help. It is now 3 weeks and I've been able to talk the whole time. I've spoken to a physical therapist today, and she couldn't find anything that she could do to relieve the pain, but she knew what the muscle did and understood and recommended I stay with the massage therapist. Another thought, some of the nerves have been strangled too. Before the massages, the left side of my tongue "tingled" and pained at the root of my tongue. Now it doesn't. I hope some of this helps anyone on this thread that is still fighting the doctors with their shortsightedness and lack of information. I don't have the complete "cure" yet, but I'm well on my way, I'm not taking massive amounts of Aleve to stop the on-going daily pain, I do take it towards the evening for the lingering pain. I'm hoping that with further sessions with massage and a visit to a laryngologist who can make a definite diagnosis, I'll be on the way to complete, painfree life. Good Luck and talk to your doctor. This has been known about in a white paper by a doctor since 1954. Make your doctor aware of the syndrome.

In the prior string that I wrote a few minutes ago, I highly suspect that I have sleep apnea. (going to a doctor for that too soon). It could, in my mind, be a cause of the strain of my neck and other issues. And I too, suffer from sinus and allergy problems. This info might help any of you that have the same problem

I've been having the same issue

Hi, I have been reading this thread for quite some time. And I have the exact same pain as mentioned here. It started last year July / August 2015, with a pain in the left side of my throat. It's located near the throat or next to it (I think) it's a spot where I have to poke around then I can feel it. The pain. The ache. Some days it hurts and aches so badly. It has happened twice so far. Right now it's the third time. The only difference is when I'm looking straight and swallowing saliva or food I feel no discomfort but the moment i turn my head to the right and swallow it hurts so badly. Right now it's really aching badly. There's pain in my throat, my jaw, my teeth, my cheeks, my ears. But only on the left side. Previously the doctor tested me for thyroid but I didn't have it. And they just asked me to monitor. I've been taking panadols to ease the pain but I can't take much as I'm on warfarin. It's just driving me crazy I'm going to see the GP tmr. Anyone have any idea what it actually is?

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Same pain as everyone else, left side of neck, beside adam's apple and under tongue on left side. I smoked less and paid more attention to my oral hygiene and pain has subsided. I use a waterpik to clean between teeth and rinse with listerine a few times a day. Pain is definitely going away.

This is fascinating. I have a very similar story. This has been going on... I don't know, 4-6 years- for reference I'm 32 years old. I also had an abscessed tooth removed; the very back one on my bottom left side. Ever since then I've had pains back there off and on. Sometimes it sorta shoots as far up as my jaw joint and as far down as my shoulder. The pain isn't particularly strong; it's just more concerning than anything else. It's sort of an ominous 'something is wrong' kind of internal pain. I've been to the doctor a couple times about it, but learned nothing. Other than some vaccinations and once when I had surgery on a broken hand this is the only thing I've went to the doctor for in my adult life, so I'm not just one of those people who constantly thinks something is wrong with me. I was worried it was some kind of leftover infection from my tooth abscess the first time I went to the doctor, but they didn't think so, so I just kinda wrote it off as some kind of nerve damage phantom pain from the tooth ordeal. It comes and goes, sometimes lasting only hours, sometimes weeks, and although you don't notice so much when you DON'T feel it, I'm pretty sure I've gone months without feeling it. If it's particularly irritating ibuprofrin eliminates most of the pain, however my limited experiences with antibiotics have not.

Then about 10 months ago something weird happened. I was feeling... I don't know how to describe it. 'Light headed' I guess. My vision and balance was fine, but it was like I was gonna pass out. I could feel my pulse in my ears and thought I was gonna tip over any instant. I went to the doctor- at first I thought it was worse after I ate, which I now believe to be a coincidence, but at the time I thought I might have diabetes since there is a little in my family. They ran a bunch of other tests too, and everything was fine, and it slowly got better over a month or so on it's own, and I convinced myself that it was nothing and it's over now. What makes me think it might be related or might have been some kind of ear thing is that my ear/nose... tube or whatever the hell it is was draining a lot on that side. I don't know if it was related or not, but thankfully once it receded completely I haven't had that again. I may have sorta freaked out about the whole thing... I wonder if that didn't make it worse. My dentist at the time I had the initial tooth problems I think thought I was a head case because I about came out of the chair when the spit sucker got too close to my infected tooth stump- I say stump because it had been root canaled and crowned, and then got infected anyway so the crown was removed, which is not fun at all. That thing was so insanely sensitive though; the air rushing through the spit sucker cooled it enough so that it felt like a full on bolt of lightning struck me right in my mouth. Anyway, he gave me... I don't remember what it was, some kind of anti anxiety medicine. Xanax maybe... I'm not sure. I know this isn't being 'sensitive' but I referred to them as 'crazy pills' and they sat for years until the second of the worst two days of this ordeal where I thought I was gonna pass out... and probably die. I took one and it seemed to help a lot. This is so embarrassing, but I think I got overly worked up about the whole thing.

Now the last few days I have a sore- well throat isn't quite the right way to describe it. It's in my neck, but it hurts when I swallow. Not at all like having a sore throat from a cold or strep throat. Again, not debilitating pain, but concerning. If I swallow a few times it goes away for a little while, but if I lie down with that side of my face down it hurts to swallow every time. It's also a little sore if I poke at my neck. All this is new, but I'm also once again experiencing my classic symptoms of it hurting where that tooth used to be and down my neck as well.

What the heck is going on with all of this... When I see other people saying they had an infected tooth removed, that really astonished me. That's what I've always attributed all this stuff too. It feels like it's still there and infected- minus the horrible sensitivity of the tooth itself, but my jaw and neck feel the same as when it was still in me. Every time I've been to the dentist I mention it and they take yet another x-ray, but they never see anything interesting.

One encouraging thing I've seen anyway is that a lot of people have had this for many years- many even longer than I have, and nobody seems to have had any serious complications. If it just hurts a little now and then I can put up with that. I've always just been worried it's a sign of something more serious. Particularly some kind of latent infection that will one day rupture or otherwise spread somewhere more important. I knew a few people who died or almost died form weird internal infections, so I know stuff like that can happen. Neither of them had any jaw or neck trouble, but it often concerned me. To see so many people with the same or similar long term symptoms really helps to worry about it less. Thanks everyone for sharing your experiences. Perhaps this is one of those cases where the only thing to fear is fear itself.

I have this and everything you can think of has been done to find out why. It was not a tooth. It was not a salivary gland. It was not any kind of ear nose or throat problem anyone could see. No cancer. What it finally turned out to be is something called "Eagle Syndrome". Has to do with a bone that extends down from just below the ear and right along where lymph nodes sit so they can become irritated by this bone called stylahyloid or something like that. It can grow too long for various reasons, in my case due to calcium deposits and it constantly irritates one side of my neck and throat and sometimes this condition can affect both sides but usually it's just one. The only treatment is to surgically reduce the length of the bone causing the problem.