Almost 18 months ago I started experiencing tinnitus in my left ear. A constant, never-ending whistle in my ear, all the time... Not fun. I talked to my mom about it, and she told me to wait for a while; maybe my shoulders were stiff, maybe my neck was stiff. So I waited, but the tinnitus never went away. Every once in a while it was more quiet, but then it picked up again. Adjusting to it was hard, falling asleep at first was hard. But after living with it for a couple of months, I became used to it just enough to not think much of it.
Then the summer came, and I was busy working. My ear didn't really bother me. The tinnitus was always there, but so what? I figured it was something caused by my wearing headphones all the time while driving (my car doesn't have a radio).
In the fall I went to the States for three months and decided I would go see a doctor after my trip. I didn't want anything to mess up my travels. I came back to Finland in December and after a week I had my first doctor's appointment.
Now let's back up a bit... Shortly after the tinnitus started in the first place, I had my first episode. Back then I didn't know it, though. I woke up one morning, feeling a little off, so I called in sick and it's good that I did, because the next thing I knew, I was throwing up so hard I thought my face was gonna fall off. I was dizzy, and every time I closed my eyes, everything started spinning rapidly and I would throw up again. I called my brother to see if he could drive me to the ER to get a doctor's note for work, but he was unable to pick me up. I knew I was in no condition to drive, but I did it anyway. The health center is less than a mile from where I live, but the drive was awful. When I walked to the ER from the parking lot, I couldn't walk straight, I probably looked like a drunk person. All in all, the episode lasted for about 4 hours, and then I passed out by my bathroom door because I was too tired to go to bed. I got some sleep, and woke up not feeling dizzy anymore, but just exhausted. Afterwards I just thought I had a really bad case of a stomach flu, and later on when I started googling things (lol) I figured I could have benign paroxysmal positional vertigo. That's what I diagnosed myself with.
There wasn't another episode until October, when I was in America. I woke up dizzy again, and on the car ride I told my friend I was going to throw up. We pulled over, but eventually I never threw up. I knew that the whole situation was somehow ear-related, and after stopping by at Wal Mart Pharmacy to pick up some congestion medicine, I started feeling better.
So, back to my first doctor's appointment, which was last December. Before that I had my hearing checked at a private clinic where my mom worked at the time, and it showed some minor hearing loss in my left ear. The nurse said she wouldn't normally forward her patients with a result like mine, but since I had other symptoms, she told me I should see a specialist.
The doctor checked my ears, did some standard tests, we talked, and eventually I remembered to bring up the dizziness. After hearing what I had to say, the doctor said it sounds a lot like Meniere's disease, but that I'm very young for that. He told me to wait until the end of January, and if I had an episode before that, I should contact him and he would prescribe me the medicine.
Sure enough, on Christmas day, I had another episode, which wasn't nearly as bad as the very first one, but resulted to throwing up as well. I called the doctor and got the meds, and now I've been on them for almost six months. After that I've had one episode in January and another in March. It's been almost three months since the last one, which is a relief and a scare at the same time. I'm thinking "great, they're not coming so often anymore!" and "oh my god, I will probably have one any day now!". Learning not to stress about it has been a real challenge. I'm still not mastering my stress levels. But I am accepting my situation, which is helpful.
Meniere's disease is an inner ear thing, that causes tinnitus, hearing loss (I've lost even more of my hearing in my left ear) and vertigo. All of my symptoms match perfectly. But there's one other thing that has similar symptoms and has to be ruled out, and it's called acousticus neurinoma, a benign tumor that's inside the skull but outside the brain, pressing something in the ear (this is where my English fails me, sorry for the lame explanation!), causing tinnitus etc. So I'm in line for an MRI, which is to exclude the tumor. After that I'll know more.
I don't hear low voices well. If I cover my right ear, which is my healthy ear, it's hard to hear. At first I slept with my left ear against the pillow, but recently I've embraced sleeping with my healthy ear against the pillow. I don't hear much, besides the tinnitus, but it's kinda nice to sleep without any disturbance. The hardest part is, that people don't see I'm sick. I don't have a hearing aid (I probably will at some point, but it's not the time for that yet), so no one can see that I'm somewhat hearing disabled. I prefer to walk on my friend's left side, so that they're on my right. If there's noise close to my right ear, and someone talks on my left side, it's hard to make out what they're saying. Their words get tangled. Also my left ear is much more sensitive to noises now. I don't like to hold my phone on it.
Wow, it's like a short story that I wrote for you! If there are others out there with Meniere's (or a suspected Meniere's like I do), let me know! Hope this wasn't a bore to read.
Take care! :)
-iira
