I’ve heard this word mentioned a lot but what does it mean with regards to mav? I.e when we are well have we compensated then when get worsening of symptoms or relapse like I have does this mean we have decompensated?
My understanding is that the brain learns to make sense of all the weird and wonderful signals that first made it unable to process them, and that was the reason for our symptoms. As the brain experiences more of the strange things it learns to compensate and deal with them as if they are normal, thus bringing our interpretation of life back to normal. This takes time, effort and patience because the brain has been used to receiving information from our ears, eyes and balance in a certain way all our lives and suddenly something has gone wrong and the system is completely turned on its head so the brain must relearn all that it has been doing, rather like going back to being a baby and learning to walk. So the more you challenge your balance the faster your brain will learn to compensate. That is my take on the situation anyway.
To compensate means the brain retrains it to cope with any injury to the vestibular system.
I believe the underlying issue that causes MAV is an unstable lesion of some kind (just observe how your symptoms rise and fall and relapse), probably a variable leak from, or variable pressure within (or both), the inner ear. I believe your brain attempts to compensate but gets pushed into a migraine state when the learning gap and sensory stress gets too great.
I don’t think you will be able to compensate until the underlying condition resolves itself or at least becomes more stable.
I gave up VRT, didn’t help me. I wouldn’t bother with it or worry about it, just get out and be active, your brain will do its best. Keep yourself challenged to give you brain something to work on.
I am nearly 2 years in and MUCH better than I was 6 months ago with no dizziness and almost no imbalance. I do still get an ‘off’ feeling but given the progress I’ve made I’m hopeful for more. None of that progress was made with VRT or any exercises, just time and healing. This is despite taking Amitriptyline, a vestibular suppressant, though I was careful to keep a very low dose (max 20mg, now @10mg) to limit the risk of failing to compensate if there was any permanent change.
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Thank you for the replies both really good to read thanks.