VERTIGO

Have any of you suffered from Vertigo? For the past couple of months, I’ve been experiencing something really strange. It’s more than a dizzy feeling, it’s a pulling me with tremendous force feeling. It happens when I lean my head all the way back, then forward again. It happens if I look down and up quickly. The weirdest part is is happens while I’m in bed. If I flip over from my right side, onto my back or left side, I am getting pulled by this evil force. It stops me in my tracks every single time. One day I got of bed too quickly and was literally being pulled to the left (or so it felt). I had to grab onto a wall to brace myself.

What is vertigo?

Learn the signs, symptoms, and treatment options of this condition that has become more and more common. It can often be mistaken for just dizziness but I encourage you to read the full description in this article from Web MD. 

The treatment I got for my vertigo

I went to the Neurologist and he did some fancy maneuver (the Dix-Hallpike test) to see if he could trigger the dizziness. He grabbed my head and laid me backward and turned my head to the left – all in one quick movement. OH BOY – he triggered it all right! The room was spinning like crazy. Thank goodness he was holding my head.

He told me that it could be little crystals deep in the ear that get dislodged and cause dizziness (Benign Paroxysmal Positional Vertigo – BPPV) He then he did some other procedure (The Epley Maneuver or Semont Maneuver) where he held my head in various positions for a certain amount of time. He told me to sleep upright for two nights.

I felt great for those two nights, but on the third night, the tugging and pulling starting again.

I’m going in to see the doctor tomorrow for him to repeat the fancy maneuver to see if it will work this time. He has also ordered a brain MRI which makes me a little nervous. He wants to check out my brain stem…great. If it is BPPV, hopefully it will be fixed tomorrow. If not, surgery is an option, but I’m not real excited about surgery on my ear.

Do any of you have any experience with Vertigo? It really is awful…I had never thought much about it before, but it is downright scary. I move much more slowly and deliberately now, as I fear being hurled to the ground!

Can an ENT help with vertigo?

Recently, my ENT did the maneuver on me (tilting my head from side to side) again to rearrange the crystals that had formed.  I had to sleep upright for three nights, but this time the maneuver did the trick!  I haven’t had a problem with Vertigo since!

Physical Therapy Treatment

Some new information on vertigo is that you can actually be treated at a Physical Therapists office. They can do the maneuver in-house saving you a visit to your doctor. In most states you do not need a doctors order to visit a Physical Therapist which is a great benefit! 

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