How To Deal With Viral Vestibular Neuritis?


Apr 18, 2014

Long story short I went to urgent care about 5 months ago because I was feeling lightheaded and disoriented. The NP told me I had an inner ear infection and gave me meds.

About 4 days later my symptoms had not improved and I went to the ER. They ran tons of tests and all were clear, then told me they also thought it an ear infection. I was diagnosed with a middle ear infection and sinusitis, told to stop my old meds and take some new ones.

I took a full round of antibiotics to clear the infection and after the bottle was empty i noticed no improvement, and may have felt worse.

I made an appointment for balance testing and an MRI with my ENT. The MRI come back squeaky clean. The balance test revealed that I had sustained "low frequency nerve damage in both ears". I now realize he probably meant vestibular nerve damage.

It's been close to 6 months now, I do feel much better than when this started but I still have constant brain fog and a feeling of imbalance. I also seem to feel worse when I go to stores or busy places. (oddly enough this excludes the gym, it's the one place I feel normal some times, I believe due to the fact working out releases endorphins, i'm not sure). I took an auditory test and they said everything seemed normal which is why I think it is neuritis and not labyrinths, as labs usually also causes hearing damage?

What do you guys think, sound like vestibular neuritis?

P.S. I'm doing some at home vestibular exercises, I meet with my ENT on the 22nd and am going to get him to refer me to VRT. At the moment the hardest thing to deal with is the brain fog, and anxiety it causes. I was thinking about asking to be put on Zoloft as my mother takes this and says it does wonders for her. I'm just nervous that it could make my brain fog worse, or slow down compensation. Do you think either of these could happen?

P.P.S. if you have a success story in dealing with this or know someone who has I would love to hear it. I'm beginning to feel that my life will always be like this and it's <seriously depressing> to be honest.

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I work in NYC so my commute walking is the worst, shopping too.

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3) Nausea (without the pills I could just be laying in my bed and fell like

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4) Disgust and Depression over this whole mess I am only 51.

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Well I took the antivert meds and tried to take care of my daughter since I'm a stay at home mom. Trying to stay awake on antivert was the worst thing I did and it put me into a severe depression like state. I have a mother who suffers from depression and I felt like I was in a hole I couldn't get out of. I called my dr and asked if I could have a perscription for xanax anything I felt like I was in a constant state of anxiety and panic along with the constant movement and unbalance and stress of what I was going to do to take care of my daughter. I finally decided to the ER where they finally gave me valium which def helped to calm me down and understand that this is a virus and not an anxiety disorder. I went to my ENT and got the vestibular neuritis. My ent told me he had suffered from a bout of this years ago and everything I was feeling was normal the panic the anxiety and was disappointed I had to go to the ER to obtain something to help me. He prescribed valium which I took at night the first 10 days. I was able to get a nanny for my daughter. I'm in week 4 and each day is different. I came down with a cold during week 3 which I think set things off again. I'm getting better from the cold. I suffer from TMJ and think it's made it hard because a lot of times before this illness I would wake up with a horrible headache from teeth grinding.

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I haven't driven since this happened. I haven't been able to take care of my daughter which is the worst of all.

I need advice on how to get back on my feet again I feel good some parts of the day and other parts I feel like I'm floating. I have been out of the house only a few times in 4 weeks. Always with my husband or a friend. This past Sunday we went out and I felt pretty good but I'm really afraid about going out alone.

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Possible To Have Vestibular Neuritis Without The Dizziness?

A year ago I fell extremely ill - I was fine the one day and the next I woke up with an extreme feeling of drunkenness, disorientation and fatigue. For the first few weeks I struggled to do anything - read, walk, drive, understand lectures (I am a student).

I went to a bunch of GPs in my area and none of them had any idea. eventually after about 4 months of feeling like this a doctor diagnosed me with "chronic fatigue syndrome" and that with rest and the right nutritional changes it should clear up in the next few months.

Fast forward 7 months and I still have this incredibly debilitating brain fog. I decided that CFS can't be correct cause I was extremely diligent and had no improvement whatsoever. I ended up seeing an ENT and he diagnosed vestibular neuritis.

Reading through the forums, many of my symptoms overlap - confusion, "brain fog", difficulty in stores and busy places, difficulty reading, problems with spacial awareness, cognitive problems, improvement of symptoms from morning to evening, fatigue, depression and anxiety.

However, at no point during the acute phase or the chronic phase of the illness have I ever felt "dizziness". The rooms has never spun, I've never fallen over, my balance seems fine. All of these being defining features of VN.

Is it possible to have VN without the dizziness? Am I perhaps misinterpreting what is meant by "dizziness" in the context of VN? My understanding of dizziness is the feeling you get when as a child you spun around in circles until the ground started to wobble and the world spin. I have never felt this during my illness.

I have just started VRT and it doesn't seem to have helped so far - I've been doing it for a week and I understand that it may be months before we have any noticeable improvement. I also just had a tonsillectomy and my symptoms deteriorated significantly postoperative.

Has anyone else ever experienced anything like this? Does this sound like just VN or could there be something else going on?

(I've had an MRI, Autoimmune screen, pretty much every blood test, hearing tests, CT scans - all of which came back fine)

How long has VRT taken to make a difference for you?

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I know why you're here...You are on these boards hoping and praying to be released from the nightmare that is Vestibular Neuritis. I explained why I spent so much time on these boards to my husband this way: It's like we've been thrown in prison for a crime we didn't commit and we need to spend every, single, waking moment looking for a way to escape--some miracle answer that will relieve us from these horrible symptoms. We've tried just about everything and we've done what our doctors have told us, but the symptoms persist...

I am here to tell you that there is hope. I was diagnosed with VN in April 2013. I was told that the condition would only last "a few weeks," and then I'd be back to normal. That absolutely did not happen. The symptoms hung on and on and on for months--I'm still not completely healed--and in the process, I have had to adjust my entire life. But today, as I type this, I am not nearly as sick and dizzy and nauseous as I once was. I can carry on conversations with people and not feel like I'm going to spin out of control! I can sit in a meeting at work and focus.

I seem to have had all of the symptoms: Nausea (really felt like I was on a boat for about 2-3 months; ringing in the ears (which they say doesn't happen with VN, but I am proof that it can); popping in the ears; ear fullness; tingly scalp; creepy crawly sensations on the face; numbness in the fingers (due to horrific anxiety); severe imbalance; really horrible neck pain; fullness in the cheeks just under the eye and near the nose; difficulty concentrating; awful dizziness; and the worst for me: real difficulty in driving. I pretty much had to stop driving all but the very shortest of distances. This has been so depressing and hard as a very busy mom who also works outside the home.

I would wake up every day and not be able to believe I was still in this horrible situation. I would start moving around a little and sure enough, the dizziness and nausea and imbalance would follow. And we have the one disorder where they tell us that medication actually hurts us in the long run! Such a Catch-22. I was fearful of taking Ativan or Valium or anything addictive, even though it would certainly help with the awful anxiety and the dizziness. It was a nightmare. I still can't believe it has happened to me.

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I also decided in July to take an SSRI. It is non-habit forming and I read one study that suggested that SSRIs actually help with ear function. I needed to get something to reduce the anxiety. I was having panic attacks just about every day. And also, having to accept that my life has been so disruptive has been indeed depressing, so the SSRI I think is helping with that.

Today, the ear popping and fullness has stopped. I still have ringing. I am not nearly as nauseous or dizzy, but I do have my days where I can feel it profoundly--these are fewer and farther between. Relapses happen, which is beyond depressing, but they are short lived. I can drive a little further--still not full time, but getting a little better with lessened anxiety. Bottom line is that it's just not as bad as it was. I think that's how we have to measure this. We have to say, "Did I feel better or worse last summer?" Not, "Did I feel better yesterday?" The improvement is so slow it's almost immeasurable, but it's there.

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Vertigo / Dizziness :: Vestibular Neuritis?

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