MAV or something else?

Specific Illnesses & Conditions VM/MAV
1

Hi everyone,

About a year ago I had an incident that left me severely debilitated for a long time. I don’t remember much of what happened, but at the time I became very ill (possibly swine flu) and ended up losing a ton of weight. During this time I began to get dizzy (24/7), racing heart, anxiety, fatigue, nausea, and tinnitus in my right ear. However, I never experienced Vertigo. After what seemed like an eternity (few months), everything managed to clear up except the tinnitus. My Doctor wasn’t sure what had happened, but I figured it was a case of Labyrinthitis due to the Tinnitus and dizziness. Anyway, 2 weeks ago I was at a party with friends where I had 4 glasses of wine as well as having taken 8mg Ephedrine and some Caffeine a few hours prior for exercising. That evening I felt fine and went to bed as usual. That night I woke up and noticed that my heart was pounding, I felt spacey, and my tinnitus was going crazy. Now, my tinnitus tends to be louder after having a few drinks, but this was different. It was much much louder and there was an additional noise in my left ear (I only have a noise in my right ear usually). This caused me to panic a little, but I managed to get back to sleep.

I woke up the next day feeling like crap, but to my relief the new noise had disappeared. The T was still loud but I just assumed that this was normal from the hangover. Throughout the day I noticed I was really feeling really lightheaded/dizzy and that my heart was racing whenever I moved around and for most of the day. These symptoms are still continuing and I’m starting to wonder if this is the same thing that happened to me a year ago. My heart starts racing when I turn in bed, get up in the morning, for no reason sometimes (This has been getting over the past week) My legs and arms also feel jelly-like, and I feel like my head feels really heavy. I’ve also been having a stuffy nose and head pressure which could be something else. Again, no vertigo but 24/7 dizziness and feeling weak as if gravity increased. I’ve also been a lot more thirsty since this happened, and need to use the bathroom more frequently. Might be due to the anxiety though… The thought of going through this ordeal again is stressing me out big time, since it took a few months to get back to normal last time.

I went to the Doctor yesterday but he wasn’t entirely sure either. He thought that the wine/ephedrine may have triggered an anxiety episode which would account for a lot of the symptoms. I just don’t understand why I would still be having these symptoms 2 weeks later. The worst isn’t just the dizziness. I feel terrible in general, like I have the flu but none of the body pains. At this moment my head feels crazy heavy along with head and neck tension.

Also, I’ve been doing a bit of reading on MAV. If you can’t stop the headache with abortives, and prophylactics don’t stop it either, then how do you make the chronic dizziness go away?

Thanks

Edit: Some additional info. I feel worse around noon and start to feel slightly better in the evenings. By the time 2pm rolls around I need to have a nap until 5pm or so. Not sure why this is.

2

Have you been checked for overactive thyroid?

Christine

3

Christine,

Yes last time this sort of thing happened. That was negative. I got another blood test done a few days ago but I doubt the results will be any different. I don’t understand where the whole body fatigue/heavyness fits in with MAV. That and the racing heart when trying to sleep :?

Thanks!

4

I am still trying to sort this out for myself. In the end they diagnosed me with ME, but thats because they didnt know what I had. Having said that, they did find low B12 which I get injections for, antibodies to the thyroid, it swings back and forth but never goes too far one way or the other. I was diagnosed first as having basilar migraine, then they thought I might have lupus, then not, then menieres, then endolymphatic hydrops finally vestibular migraine which I had sort of worked out myself by then because severe vertigo attacks were often before or after a nasty migraine. I often feel like I am going down with the flu but nothing happens. I get this if I overdo it. Too much physical work etc. I also suffer reactive hypoglycemia which sometimes accounts for the dizziness and weakness etc. (You can test this out for yourself with a glucometer from the chemist).

I get the racing heart at night, like fluttering, its usually after some stress, or even the stress of not being able to sleep. I have only really had this since the hormones dropped. I also get the tinnitus, have it at the moment, high pitched hissing.
My heart rate can go up to 103 just getting up and going downstairs and going back up again and I start sweating yet at rest it is 70. I can stop the heart fluttering at night with propanalol although I dont use it all the time.

There has been some interesting research lately on (so called) ME being caused by a latent virus, but its still early days.

Christine

5

What is ME?

6

myalgic encephalomyelitis (Chronic Fatigue Syndrome).

7

Just Googled it and I really hope you don’t have that! Are you dizzy 24/7 all year or does it happen in episodes? I’m hoping mine will go away eventually as it did the first time, but I might ask my GP for migraine meds to see if they help.

8

Ugh I just experienced “Marshmallow Feet” for the first time and now I’m scared to get up and walk around. This hasn’t ever happened before, so I hope things aren’t getting worse.