Good luck with whatever path you choose. I was where you were and just want you to know you don't have to live like this, there are proven solutions to lead a normal life. Wish you the best with whatever you decide.
You can always go to the hospital again, so you don't have to wait two months. Additionally you can download the app "7 cups" or "7 cups of tea". You can talk to someone 1on1 who lends a listening ear and will talk to you for free anytime of day, a great tool in your arsenal to not feel alone when you may need it. The people offering help also have ratings. If you think you can benefit from staying at your parents place that may be a good idea. You are a priority, if you don't feel well you can't take care of anyone else anyway, so best to take care of yourself first. Lower altitude also makes you feel better I think you said. One more thing, if you go to the hospital ask your doctor if you can take a magnesium supplement, specifically magnesium citrate. It helps you relax and feel calm at the same time it's prescribed to people with migraine's. I hope you feel better soon!
I guess I have more to write here. You said you made pork shoulder, cumin, carrots, salt and diced can tomatoes. I'm not sure if you check the can of tomatoes but that in itself has a decent amount of sodium either naturally or added to the can. I would stay away from cannabis personally, you never know what they could have laced it with or if it's a bad batch , contaminated etc. It's also possible you might be having some withdrawal anxiety from not using it, which if that's the case it will pass. When I sit at the computer I tend to wobble like I'm on a boat. Video games like racing games made me a bit dizzy/anxious/fainty. You want to stay away from games that give anxiety. I know this first hand. Watching tv for me is not so bad, but if there is too much motion of the camera I feel like the room is on a boat. I recommend getting Songza and putting on the "Muted Jazz" playlist and draw something. The music is so slow it will slow your breathing which is great for calming down. Also regarding magnesium, 200mg is the dose, at night it will help sleep. If you need it in the morning you can take one then too.
Can't you ask your doctor's office for a cancellation time to have you on stand by so you can come in if someone cancels? The Magnisum Citrate is a good idea as well.I take 400 mg every day.You can get it without a prescription. Video games are not good for Mav or mm for that matter.It's too much stimulation for the already overactive brain.
Have you looked at Dr. Hains website? http://www.dizziness-and-balance.com/disorders/central/migraine/migraine%20prevention.html
i did have the laby for what was diagnosed as mm. I went to the following hospitals and clinics on my three year journey/oddessy Atlanta Ear Clinic, Shea Ear Clinic (Memphis, Tenn.) Emory University, Johns Hopkins, House Ear Clinic (Los Angeles) and MEEI (Harvard, Dr. Rauch) The neurologist at Emory was not so sure if it was mm or mav so he gave me Verapamil for six months and then on to Celexa for six months. Then he said the only way for him to tell if i had mm or mav was to see me in an attack. I had an attack one morning before my wife went to work (she works at Emory) and she drove me in and he could tell by the movement of my eyes that it was an mm attack. Six days later i was Dr. Rauch's office at MEEI and he gave me my options ---- he recommended the laby and when I told him i lived in Atlanta he called Dr. Mattox at Emory for me and 3 days later i had the laby and my life back. I was desparate, i wanted to die. I had two young kids (ages 2 and 4) and a beautiful wife and very successful company and it meant nothing, i wanted to die. ----- After talking to Dr. Rauch, he told me it was not the end of the world and that i do not need my ears to live a normal, productive life (god gave us 3 different balance systems and we only need to function) and that i would never have to live deaf because he could put a Cochlear Implant in my laby ear if ever needed. Look no further than our good friend AKJim, he has absolutely zero balance function in both his ears, he has cochlear implants in both ears and he practices/d medicine as a Radiologist (i believe i have the right person) and he travels the world. This is a shit/horrific disease but there are ways out of it, the list is long of people who realized there is a solution to this, but unfortunately they have moved on to live their lives and can you blame them. God Bless everybody with this disease, i was there, i wanted to die, but when Dr. Rauch and my wife told me i did not have to live like that then the decision was mine and i chose what i knew would take care of my problem. Hope and Prayer are good things to have, but they are not proven medical solutions. This will be my last post on this thread. Good luck and i pray for sunnier/better days ahead for Vitolony Good luck everybody.
Thanks for all the inputs. I'm already taking 400MG daily of magnesium citrate. I've been taking that for a number of weeks now. Not sure how much it is helping. On the cannabis front, I've already passed the mild anxiety period of non-use so that wasn't really an issue. My interest now is in how it could potentially give me some emotional slack while I figure out the migraine stuff. Which might allow me to stay in Colorado near my kids. I did end up using some high CBD stuff last night, a fairly small amount, and I'm glad it was only a small amount, cause it caused more anxiety, though it passed in an hour or so. Perhaps that's part of what put me in the hospital in the first place, cause I was using that strain before being locked down. I have 1 more strain I'd like to try, though I'm going to probably wait a week before doing so, just to make sure the other stuff is totally out of my system first. On the labrynthectomy front, the MM is under control. I haven't had a full blown vertigo attack that left me deafer in my bad ear since around February-April of this year. Now it all seems to be migraine related. So I don't think the laby will help any. Though I can certainly understand how and why people go there. If there was a surgery available right now that could take my problems away, even if it involved a recovery period, I'd probably take it. I started using meclizine last night. Taking 1 pill morning and night. Perhaps that will help some over time. What's the half life on that stuff? Will it build up a little bit in my system? Also, even though my doctor can't see me for 2 months, the office has a PA that is going to see me for 2 appointments on Tuesday and then Wednesday of next week. The first is to discuss disability paperwork. The second will be to discuss my medications, see about raising the dose of amatriptiline and to ask about thyroid issues. I've seen some of the material on the Dr. Haines website, but not all of it. I'll give it a more thorough read before going to the "doctor" (the PA) on Wednesday. I really don't want to have to go stay at my dads, but if I don't get more substantial relief soon, I feel like I'll have no other choice. Being alone without my children and dealing with this disease right now is a pretty potent cocktail of negative realities. I would feel a shit ton safer if I had people around me. I called a friend a week or two ago and asked if I could stay with him, and he never even called me back, so that one is probably out. In a way, I actually like living alone, though I don't want it to be permanent. It's nighttime that makes me feel so unsafe. When I would normally get to tuck my children into bed. Sometimes, all I can do is stand outside the doors to their bedroom and just cry at the emptiness. Back home, there are so many people who love me. Maybe I should just get the short term disability paperwork sorted and move to California. But damn that scares me too, living so far away from my children. And what if the elevation truly is part of the equation and I try to move back to Colorado after getting better and become symptomatic again? It's like trying to choose between my arms or my legs. I want both. But I may not be able to have them. I suppose children grow up away from one parent all the time and only see them occasionally throughout the year. Skype and phone calls will have to be enough. But dear God, I hate that idea. Hate it with a passion. Would I get used to it anyway? Your inputs are helping keep me alive right now. Having people who seem like they care what happens to me....
Vitolony, I care and at least partially understand what you are going through. I have Meniere’s or vestibular migraine…heck, I don’t even know what it is for sure. Nothing I’ve tried has given me any meaningful relief, but I’m going to keep looking and bugging the doctors and you’ve got to also. I’ve lost weight too and need to gain it back. It’s all the low sodium food, no sauces, cheese, etc. Will your kids come to stay with you each week? If so, that could help your loneliness. I can’t tell you what is best for you. I hope that you will get a sign from God, your family, or someplace unexpected, and you will know what is right. Please stay in touch and let us know how you are doing and what you decide.
Bulldogs, thank you for sharing. My understanding is that a laby doesn't help with MAV, but I could be wrong.
For the immediate future, no, unfortunately. This disease, combined with my pending divorce, and other issues I can't really go into on a forum like this, combined to put me into a mental hospital. I chose to go, so I have that working in my favor, but my wife wouldn't let the kids stay with me right now. She will eventually not have a choice, as the powers that be will not keep my kids from me forever when I have basically done everything right in the face of absolute shit circumstances. But, for the time being, that's the way things are. Supervised visitation only really. And if I move to California to spend time recovering with my dad, which I am sorely tempted to do, I won't get to see them physically at all. Except for the possibility of them coming to visit me perhaps at Christmas or something. That would help some, but being 1200 miles away from them will take a different kind of toll on me. I feel like I'm having to chose between my children and my life. But, they have no father at all if I'm dead.
Oh, I'm sorry to hear that. You could try a mini-vacation in which you go to stay with your dad for a few weeks or months and see how you feel being away. Just throwing that out there.
That's kind of what it would be. Except once I sign up for it, I would need to stay until I feel better. Not sure how long that would take. Part of it involves selling my house, which I am cleaning and preparing now. Once that is done, I won't have a place to move back to. I don't see how I could move back if the disease is not controlled. Short term disability is for 3 months, so that is an externally imposed time frame. I would either need to start working again after that, or go on long term disability, which I imagine is through social security? I don't really even know anything about that, but I can't imagine it's easy to get. I'm still assuming that the PA will approve the short term disability on Tuesday when I go to see them. If they don't then I have to chose between trying to stay, or moving to California and going through bankruptcy. Not to mention the burden that puts on my wife and her parents to provide for my children. The best solution would be for me to get control of this now. I have goals and plans and a life I want to build now that my soon to be ex is no longer limiting my future. I know that sounds heartless, but even apart from our relational problems, we wanted very, very different lives. And I want to start my new life. I just need to have my health to do it. I feel a little better today... maybe. It's always hard to accurately judge how I'm feeling. In the moment any bowling ball headed-ness drives my anxiety. It's easier to judge how I feel over larger time scales.
While I know first-hand how hard it is, the thing to focus on is the positives. When I was at my worst, always clusters of attacks within a couple of weeks and then the waiting game till the next batch...but CONSTANT 24/7 heavy ear pressure, ringing, lack of hearing, fatigue. It was all I could do to get up, go to work, come home. No energy. Honestly don't remember a lot of that period because there was nothing to remember. Going thru hell and motions. During that time, my mom was still alive, I would talk to her every day (she had major medical issues). She would ask if it was a "good ear" day. Well initially I would respond no, ear is full, ringing.....blah blah. My mom would ask if I went dizzy (vertigo). If it was a no, then she would say "it's a good day". If it was yes but the attack was "only" 3 hrs (versus 6 or 8) "pretty good". Initially that bugged the crap out of me. But couldn't vent too much with all of her medical issues that normal humans wouldn't survive! Slowly though it went into my mind. I started focusing more on the positives. If all ear issues were bad but no vertigo. That was a good day and I said thanks every night for a good day. If my attack was shorter than some previous, I focused on that piece..could be worse. And I shifted my thinking into comparing how many people have it worse. With this disease but with other medical issues. The more I focused on good, the less control this disease had. ABSOLUTELY it sucks major donkeys when the vertigo hits and I am puking. Absolutely sucks when I have no energy. I also learned that my co-workers had no problems stepping up to help me. Drive me home, check on me if needed...it was ME who had the issue asking or expecting help. (I am a control freak). Stress, lack of sleep and sinus are my triggers. Good luck. I know that it is hard. Not trying to make it seem simple. But for me, changing (slowly) my thinking to focus on what I have vs what is gone made the difference and I believe helped me turn a corner.
For me, it always felt like a violation to invalidate my own suffering with thoughts of, "someone else has it worse". Sure, plenty of people in the world feel more shitty than I do, but how does that help me? Perhaps acceptance is what you are talking about. Being able to accept that this is my life and finding joy in it despite the bullshit. That's a concept I can grab onto in some regards. The last full blown vertigo attack I had, 3 or so months ago, was kind of an interesting event. While it was every bit as bad as every other one I've had, with a couple exceptions, it didn't take the emotional toll I was expecting. I think because it's not quite so shocking as it once was. It's the days and weeks after the attack where I am chronically off balance and bowling ball headed that suck for me and perhaps that's what I need to work on accepting. Or, finding little victories more fulfilling. What has been helping lately, is some tai chi. I don't go for the spirituality that the tai chi guys talk about, but if I simply substitute my own spirituality and work with the love of God instead of the energy that the tai chi guys work with, that helps tremendously. I've actually slept decently well the last 2 nights after going through the motions. And I have no shortage of goals that I want to achieve, and focusing on those helps too at times. Then, talking to my family helps more than I can say. I never realized just how much they love me. That's a sad statement, but talking to them makes me feel like I'm not quite so alone. But it seems that it's only while I'm talking to them that I feel better. I can't talk to them all the time. In some regards though, all this feels like me just trying to convince myself that's its okay that I feel this way. But its not. Can the human spirit suffer indefinitely and be okay? There's a reason why so many people in just this thread have confirmed that they wanted to kill themselves. And there are perhaps a couple folks who might still be around to post in this thread but aren't because they did what a number of us have tried to avoid. Bulldogs talks about those who have gone on in success. There is also the other side of the coin. Those who have lost this fight. And that's what this is. It's a dog fight. Brutal and ugly. I'm not looking for excuses to lose my fight. Quite the opposite. If I think moving to California will hurt my kids, what will it do to them to have the testimony of a father who killed himself? That would devastate them in ways I can't even understand. My father still lives, and he has fucking cluster headaches! And THAT is the one and only reason I have not yet done this to myself. The cost it would exact on those who love me. I just don't think that someone else suffering more than I do does anything to alleviate my suffering. A worse negative than mine makes mine less negative? I don't see how that helps me. Please don't take that personally. Some of your other ideas are perfectly valid, and for some, perhaps looking at a worse negative makes them feel better. Just makes me feel worse to look too deeply into the darkness.
After the darkness always comes the light. You just need to move towards it. You also need to stay close to your kids. You will regret it deeply one day if you don't and so will they.
It is difficult to make decisions when you are in physical and mental pain. There is support available for you through the Suicide Prevention Lifeline 1-800-273-8255. I hope you will give these folks an opportunity to help you out of your despair. From what I have read and if I am wrong with my thoughts correct me, you are in need of professional help. We can all offer our support on this forum but I truly feel you need more than what everyone has been so kind to offer you here. Do it for yourself and for your loved ones. Best of luck to you.
Absolutely acceptance. But also I found that this disease and how it made me feel kept me in a dark place focused and thinking about everything bad this thing caused, how bad I feel, how I didn't feel up to anything, how I couldn't trust going out anywhere, how the pressure in my ear was exhausting....a continuous loop of everything negative and horrible. Which is, of course, a reality. BUT I didn't have to stay focused on everything bad. If I focused on the small positive things THAT day, something to hold on to. And absolutely everyone is different. For me trying to keep in mind how other people had it worse helped me to stay grounded and realize that while my struggle was real - if others could get through worse or longer episodes, more frequent episodes, etc....it helped ME stay out of a circle of darkness. Not saying it is for everyone - but whatever it is, for you it might be your kids - it is finding ONE thing at least to keep focused on in a positive way. I also agree with RedWing that whether it is suicide prevention line, a group near your house, dr, whoever...you should reach out to talk through things and find a way out of your current hell. I guarantee (without even knowing them) that your kids absolutely want you to be around.
I know full well that my kids want me around. That's why I haven't already moved to California. I desperately want to remain a physically present father, even if I only see them a couple times a week. And while it would be traumatic for everyone if I were to leave town, it would be better in the long run that I am still alive. Being alone right now simply compounds my issues. I know being physically absent from my kids will compound them in a different way. That's why this is such a fucking terrible decision to have to make. There is only 1 person in this town who isn't my child who gives a shit what happens to me that I don't have to pay money to. And he has 10 children and no room in his life for anything more than occasional phone calls. I don't blame him for that, but nobody else cares what happens to me. I called my soon to be ex last night and asked her opinion about what I should do, and while she will support my decision to go home, if that's what I feel I have to do, she clearly doesn't really care what happens to me. Thankfully, those phone calls home are working for now. They care. They care a lot. That's why I am so tempted to go home. To be around people who care. And my dad has a kick ass neurologist he can get me in to see.
Thanks RedWing. If I feel the urge, I'll give them a call. Though lately, I've just been calling my parents, or my sister, or my cousin. They love me and talking to them keeps me grounded. And you are quite right that I am in need of professional help. I've been screaming at the top of my lungs around here asking for help, but sometimes it seems like nobody takes me seriously unless I utter the words.... I'm thinking of hurting myself. Then all they want to do is throw you into a mental hospital. Which for someone like me with as many food issues as I have, they might as well just kill me. During my last stay in the mental hospital, my anxiety was worse than it is on the outside, partly because they cannot possibly hope to feed me a diet in there that is good for me and I lost 10 pounds in 4 days. Too much of that and it won't be a hospital, it'll be a morgue cause my heart will just stop beating at some point if I loose enough weight. Or other problems will pop up making my already existing problems worse. That place isn't an answer. It's a cage. On the issue of professional help, I also called my psychiatrist this morning to request a call back so I can tell him that my anxiety is running away from me. I tried a very small amount of that second strain of cannabis last night, and did not have a pleasant trip. So it seems that cannabis has betrayed me as well. I think I just have too much other shit going on, too many other stressors. And while slightly buzzed, my brain runs amuck amongst all those and it feels worse. So no more green stuff for me for now. Perhaps when I've got my life under control I might be able to try again, cause I do enjoy it. But right now it only makes things worse. I went to the PA this morning, and she told me that the scheduling people should not have had me ask her to fill out the disability paperwork, so I have another appointment tomorrow to go over that again. They drew blood to check thyroid issues and a few other odds and ends. They also upped the dose of amitriptyline. They suggested that singulair can make psychological problems worse and so they suggested that I just start back on zyrtec. I stopped drinking cows milk on a google search that suggested casein is a migraine trigger and started drinking rice milk instead with my morning cereal(rice chex with honey). It doesn't have as much protein in it, so I bought a meat grinder and plan on putting together some homemade sausage without any of the stuff that makes sausage a migraine trigger. I'll be making some chicken thigh sausage with sage, salt, pepper and brown sugar and I think the other spice is marjoram? Are any of those problematic? Then I'll just cook it right up and eat it within a day or two so it doesn't sit around long. Then make more. My weight has been stable for over a week now at 203. In a way, I need more than just professional help. I need family. And I just don't have it right now. I need hope. Any other ideas? I'm willing to try damn near anything.