Really?!? That is SOOO good to hear. I had gone down to 1 800MG a day acyclovir and the dizzy days came back. Didn't have full blown vertigo, just felt crappy. Bumped it back up to 2 a day and it has calmed down again. Haven't had a really dizzy day for a week now. During that 8 months, did you periodically try to decrease the dose? How often?
yes I periodically tried to decrease. I don't recall how often but I remember after a few tries try I was afraid to try again so stayed on the 1200 mg for maybe 3 months until I got the nerve to try again and then I was successful.
I added the monolaurin on April 20. I don't think the virus is dead, yet. I still have tinnitus and hearing is not as good as the other ear. No vertigo and a lot less dizzies. So, maybe it's working.
There has to be some mechanism for inhibiting hearing that we suffer from that one can recover from though. At my worst, which was approximately last November, I had lost 60% of the hearing in my bad ear. I felt deaf as a post back then. Today, my hearing has returned to roughly what it was before all this mess started for me back in August 2014, maybe slightly worse. Why does it seem that we can recover lost hearing? Even that most recent Dr. Gacek paper you posted Vicki says that hearing can be recovered.
It is my understanding that whether hearing can be partially recovered or not is based on the length of time and severity of attacks. The longer that someone has had active Meniere's and the more attacks one experienced are major factors. Each attack starts to destroy the hearing. Believe I also read in that article posted that hearing recovery was based on how bad it was at time the a/v were started. If the hearing was destroyed to a certain point than improvement was not seen.
Here is the quote pertaining to hearing from the recent Gacek study posted: The nineteen patients with no improvement in hearing were divided into 2 groups based on the level of hearing at diagnosis. Nine patients presenting with a PTA of 50db and SD of 50% or better experienced good control of vertigo (6 out of 7; 2 with no follow-up). Ten patients with PTA of 60db or more and SD below 50% exhibited poor control of vertigo with antivirals (3 out of 10). The duration of MD in the group with hearing improvement was shorter (2.4years) than the group with no improvement (5.5years).
Ability to hear can be impeded (or prevented) by several factors. Congestion or pressure in the inner or middle ear can prevent sound waves from reaching the sound-detecting hair cells in the inner ear. Clear the congestion and hearing is restored. But hearing can also be reduced or lost when inner-ear hair cells are damaged or lost. There is no recovery from this damage. Mammals (unlike birds) are unable to re-grow damaged or lost hair cells. So, in cases where a therapy has "restored" hearing, the hearing loss was not caused by hair cell loss; it was by congestion, pressure, etc. outside the inner ear. But once hair cells are lost --- which happens in chronic Meniere's conditions--- there can be no restoration of hearing in the affected ear. That's my case. For the several years I was personally experimenting with the things that successfully ended up in my Meniere's treatment regimen (http://www.zoominternet.net/~kcshop/JOH.pdf), the disease destroyed the hair cells in my left inner ear. I am, and always will be utterly deaf in that ear. The regimen has eliminated any Meniere's symptoms, thankfully, and I lead a rather normal life, except for the deafness in my left ear. Hair cell loss is permanent deafness. Other forms of deafness, where the hair cells remain intact, can allow hearing restoration. --John of Ohio
My attacks always made me deafer in my bad ear. The additional deafness would usually fade in the days and weeks that followed the attack, unless I had another attack too quickly, in which case it was made worse. I had 3-4 really bad attack in a 2 week period that lead to being 60% deaf. Yet it went back down to only 30% deaf or so. Is that typical? Can congestion account for that?
The loss of hearing from MD may be different, at least initially than other types of inner ear hearing loss. It may be that the hair cells are deactivated or maybe turned off from structural changes that are occurring from MD. It may be very different than the loss caused by otoxic drugs or acoustic trauma. It seems like the hair cells can be reactivated to some extent if the disease can be stopped or reversed early enough. Im pretty sure there have been cases where the loss was not conductive and hearing was partially regained which does fly in the face of accepted wisdom that sensorineural loss is totally irreversible. I even wonder if changes to the endolymph could account for reduced hearing. I believe that hydrops causes stretching and displacement of the membrane and that somehow effects hearing. When hydrops reduces, hearing comes back but after enough time and damage its less likely.
But do anti-virals, monolaurin, etc. actually kill the virus? I thought that it just goes into remission and can flare up again especially if treatment stops.
For me, each attack I would lose all hearing in that ear. A few days after "most" hearing would be destroyed. But over time, each time would only get back say 80% - so within a couple of years the hearing in the bad ear was down to -55. That of course fluctuates and some days is worse, but the loss was cumalative vs immediate.
antivirals do not kill viruses, nothing so far kills viruses but monolaurin studies said it kills viruses in vitro
I heard and read somewhere that coconut oil/lauric acid/monolaurin brought down the HIV virus count. I'm not sure if this is fact or fiction. Also wondering how LuLu is doing since she's been on it for a while, maybe she's doing good that she forgot about the forum? That would be nice.
I think that is fact. Vicki posted links to a pub med study on it... I think... in this thread somewhere.
I read some of it, had brain fog so couldn't interpret everything properly, but what I saw is that the people who responded well for the HIV viral count that got lowered took actual real coconut oil (have to remember that the whole food has other components that possibly make things work better synergistically). Then I recall a video I saw a few weeks ago about coconut being an antiviral and about HIV, the guy recommends 4 tablespoons of coconut oil per day. Most of us don't have HIV and I don't either but since we're after herpes it's good to know this. The guy mentions it in this video. Coconut: Anti-Bacterial, Anti-Viral and Boosts Metabolism for Weight Loss https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3N755xXfsXs Then there is this lady who followed his protocol which I think is just the 4 tablespoons per day with her results. Seems real to me. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z2FbBPhkN9I Also found just one testimonial online ( I thought there would be more) of someone who also took 4 tbsp per day and got their viral load down. http://ehealthforum.com/health/topic129335.html (first post) So maybe it's best to take the actual whole coconut oil itself rather than monolaurin? I sure as hell hopes it works for herpes as it does on hiv. It seems though that hiv actual can detect the viral load (which seems to imply they are more open and active) while herpes can be inactive. Which brings me to the idea of then if herpes doesn't respond so well maybe we need to activate it (sounds insane right?) , by taking more argenine or lessening lysine slowly while maintaining the 4 tablespoon coconut oil. That way the herpes can hopefully become active and get out of its hiding place so the coconut oil can round house kick it? My theory
Hi everyone It was 3 months ago today that I had my last vertigo attack. I've been taking 2 tsps of monolaurin 3 times a day for the last few weeks and that has helped somewhat with the 'close calls' I was having where I felt as if an attack was coming but never actually happened. I still have quite a few days every month where disequilibrium is a big problem. I've had to break out the cane again but I'll take the wonkiness any day over having vertigo. Vitolony, Sharon, Qntario and Gardengal - I'm so pleased to read that you're all doing pretty well with managing the dreaded vertigo. I wish you all continued success! MJPMIN and Prozeal - Sending good thoughts and best wishes to you both that the monolaurin will be a successful treatment for you! Santa - I'm so very happy to read you've had no vertigo and you're a lot less dizzy.....that's wonderful! I certainly hope this will continue. All my best to you! Wishing everyone here my best. Blessings to all of you! Take care and be well, Lulu ♥