I see an oto-neurologist at UCI Medical Center in Orange County who has been the most helpful for control of my symptoms. He believes in the research that has come out of Johns-Hopkins University. For MAV, it is not about retraining your brain or your brain learning to compensate. There is no cure. It is about trigger avoidance. When too many triggers affect you at one time, it may be impossible to calm the nerves down and you may need medication for a short term. My doctor feels that the inner ear problems are usually an extension of these migraine origins and unfortunately, some of us have permanent damage in the ear because we do not get help soon enough. It is about trigger avoidance for these inner ear issues also. My ear fullness and tinnitus are very reduced when I am very careful about trigger reduction (the extreme fluctuation makes a good case for it not being Meniere’s). The added heat of summer is the one trigger that I cannot seem to control and that usually leads me to a short course of medication (Nortriptyline). The article from Johns-Hopkins, “MIgraine - More Than A Headache” (Teixido and Carey are the authors) has been posted on mvertigo before but I will include it here if you wish to read it. Vertigo Tales and Tastes: (9) Resources
I’m extremely pleased that you’ve seen a significant reduction in symptoms and reports like that give everyone hope, me included.
But, in friendly way, and with respect, Im going to disagree with you. I think doctors are usually only guessing about what’s really going on in our ears and mainly because they lack the tools. I bet you in 20 years time medicine will look back at today and be slightly embarrassed they made up this whole rubbish about migraines causing these symptoms. It’s entirely the other way around imho. Our completely healthy brains are having migraines due to some instability in our ear or ears which pushes the brains learning algorithm to its limit and we end up with a migraine. My symptoms started way before I had a single migraine and it was only when my symptoms got to a peak that I started to get migraines. There is nothing wrong with our brains, they are doing the best they can in a difficult situation: that is trying to optimise the vestibular system with a wildly fluctuating response from the ear or ears.
My situation maybe somewhat unique in that I had significant symptoms before ever having a migraine because of them. I’ve been told I have MAV but how does that explain my positional vertigo??
The whole fashionable MAV diagnosis is a great big catch all bucket that’s far too convenient for practitioners and all too neatly has a medical solution that so many doctors go no further with. Now conservative therapy may well turn out to be the right approach but doesn’t mean the theory was right.
The fact that we STILL dont have the technology to explain Menieres speaks VOLUMES.
It’s a completely ridiculous and a highly unfortunate state of affairs given how we apparently have the tech to get men to Mars yet don’t know what’s going on in the inner ear with sufficient detail: we don’t even know how the inner ear clears debris!! We only have hypotheses. And MAV is only that together with a broad dogma that has emerged.
Im very grateful for the significant knowledge we have for managing these conditions (the meds are game changing and quite frankly life saving given the psychological carnage these ear conditions can cause) but in my opinion we have our own body to thank for the fact that we ultimately get better. Evolution is still vastly more sophisticated than medical technology.
Rant over 
So on this thread, it seems to me that almost EVERY TIME I EAT I get symptoms. It is crazy. I am eating only safe foods, though did add a little salt to lunch. But I got symptoms from eating a cooked pear tonight. That’s like my go-to safe food. Arggggg. Don’t understand. Full ears ringing and dizzy.
No more like once a week is okay. But not daily. And I used to walk the 14 flights of steps a few times a day and that made me.dizzy too, all that turning around and around. Right now I’m living on the ground floor only. Not even going up to my bedroom. Sleeping on the couch.
Suzanne, forgive me, are you on any medication yet?
Tried 25mg of Topamax earlier this earlier this month and couldn’t tolerate it after 5 days. Now on 18mg of Effexor and am doing a little better but sooo slowly. Still can’t take walks. I tried Nort years ago for depression and couldn’t tolerate that. Also on Migrelief and Magnesium which helps a lot. Can’t look at a computer. No TV. I can read books.
Amitriptyline helps me with visual stuff. Hope you get relief soon!
Makes complete sense to me. The weirdest thing that gives me a few seconds of dizziness is when I’m on some website and I’m already scrolled all the way to the bottom, but I don’t realize that and I try to scroll down more. My brain and my eyes expect upward motion of the page but nothing happens and it really messes with my head for a few seconds!
I can relate to that. Unexpected visual movements are really bad for me
( STRESS !!! ) that’s what brings on my attacks !