Meniere's disease and alcohol

I like drinking. Though I don't drink a large amount, I just do not like the idea of having dinner without any drink. Before suffering from Meniere's disease, I used to like sake, beer, wine, shochu, etc. It seems, however, that this disease severely affected my tolerance for alcohol. Alcohol often--though not always--exacerbates my dizziness. When I did not have this disease, I kind of enjoyed the feeling of slight light-headedness that alcohol invited. But now, I tend to see this light-headedness as a symptom of a major vertigo attack, and cannot enjoy drinking as much as I used to. In fact, I have had several episodes after having drinks.

So I now do not drink any liquor (shochu, whisky, bourbon). They are just too strong for me. I stopped drinking sake and wine as well. The only alcohol I consume right now is beer. But I still have to be very careful about when to have beer. I only drink the days I do not have any symptoms of the disease such as tinnitus. I seem to tolerate one beer, but not two.

In addition to limited alcohol intake, I am keeping a quite strict low salt diet. I completely stopped taking caffeine and quit smoking, too. My dietary life is pretty boring now. I now and then have this impulse to go to a Korean or Thai restaurant and order whatever looks good in the menu, drink a lot of beer, have a big Chocolate cake and a cup of espresso, and then go to a bar to have a glass of bourbon and smoke a cigarette. But I know that if I did this, I would have to be lying down on my futon staring at the spinning ceiling and throwing up for most of the following day.

Please feel free to comment. Thanks.

Meniere's disease and exhaustion

I have not updated this blog for more than a week. During that period, I only had a few episodes, but was extremely exhausted all the time. I was light-headed and unsteady, feared that an attack was coming at any moment, and did not want to do anything (though I forced myself to go out and stop at my office to have some work done) . I finally began to feel better from this morning, so decided to update my blog.

I have had this type of exhaustion period several times since I was diagnosed with Meniere's disease. I do not know what is causing. I once asked my ENT doctor why I was so tired. He immediately suspected that my exhaustion was coming from electrolyte abnormality; if you continue taking a diuretic for a long period of time, this sometimes affects your electrolytes. He gave me a blood test, but I had no problem with my electrolytes. So I still do not have a clear explanation about my exhaustion. But it seems that it is not uncommon for patients with Meniere's disease to stay exhausted even when they do not have attacks.

Is chiropractic effective or not?

I have been seeing a chiropractor for about two months. I heard some people with Meniere's disease saying it helped, so decided to give it a shot. Since my insurance covers chiropractic, I only have to pay a small amount of co-pay for each visit. This makes it easy for me to see my chiropractor quite frequently.

I am not sure if it is working or not. But certainly my neck, shoulders, and head feel lighter after a treatment. The ringing and fullness of my right year are often accompanied by the pain and stiffness of my neck and shoulders. After a treatment, ringing and fullness are sometimes (not always) gone together with the neck and shoulder pain. But I can't tell whether this is an effect of chiropractic or just a coincidence.

The first ENT doctor I saw when I moved to this city was skeptical of chiropractic. He explicitly said that it would not help. He said there was no evidence that demonstrated the effectiveness of chiropractic for patients with Meniere's disease. But I do want to believe that chiropractic is helping me in some ways. If Meniere's disease is caused by inflammation of an inner ear, can't it be possible that chiropractic enhances blood circulation in the ear and thereby relieves the inflammation?

Please feel free to comment.

Meniere's disease and its timing

One of the most annoying aspects of this disease is the unpredictability of an attack. It does not choose timing. It comes when it wants. Dealing with this disease for more than two years, I have become quite good at predicting when an attack is imminent, but my prediction still fails most of the time. When I had an attack during a job interview several months ago, I felt extremely miserable and hated my disease.

Today was another time an attack came when it should not. I went to a end-of-year party at my workplace. My tinnitus had been bad for a few days, but I had already had a minor attack yesterday. So I did not expect to have another attack two days in a row. I was wrong. The minute I arrived there, my fullness of the right year reached a peak, had difficulty in hearing other people's voices, and began to sweat though we were in a nicely air-conditioned room. I went up to my office, and took antivert and zofran (to prevent nausea). I went back to the party room, and tried to chat with other people. But I could do so only for thirty minutes. I went back to my office, lay down for about forty minutes, and came home (thank god I live near the workplace, so I don't have to drive).

Today's attack was not too bad, It lasted for a few hours. I only felt dizzy and unsteady; the world did not spin around me. After recovering from an attack, however, I always think about the time I lost by just lying down and sweating. For this two years, how much time have I wasted on my futon?

Friday, finally...

This week has not been too bad. Although I had a few minor attacks, they came at night while I was sleeping. When I woke up in the middle of night, I found that everything around me was spinning. Of course, ideally, I do not want to have any attacks, but if I do have to have one, night is a good time because I have to sleep anyway, and therefore the attack does not affect my social life. Also, next morning I have an attack, I am pretty convinced I can spend one full vertigo-free day since it is very rare to have attacks two days in a row.

Yesterday my tinnitus was horrible, and I was quite sure that an attack was imminent. Strangely, however, I didn't have any attack. All day today, I just felt so drowsy, sleepy, and unstable, but did not have a vertigo attack. I don't like these symptoms, but unless I have vertigo, I can function all right in most professional settings. I cannot tell whether these symptoms were signs of a minor Meniere's attack or caused by my medications (valium and antivert). But anyway, I am very glad I did not have to cancel any of my work schedule today. I even went out for a drink with a colleague after work. I hope next week will be the same or better.

Please feel free to share your comments.

Medications I Take

I used to find it pretty easy to control Meniere's disease. I was diagnosed with this disease in the summer in 2008 after experiencing a long period of tinnitus and several acute attacks. My ENT doctor back in California prescribed a diuretic and told me to follow a low salt diet. Even before being diagnosed with this disease, I had noticed that attacks often came after I ate salty food out, so my doctor's suggestion for a low salt diet made sense to me. Once I started to take a diuretic and reduced salt from my diet, I rarely had attacks.

From last December, however, all symptoms came back. Since then, I have been trying many kinds of drugs, almost all of which do not seem to be working well. My new ENT doctor switched from lasix to another type of diuretic. It did not work. He told me to take valium at onset of vertigo. I do not think valium is helping me particularly. It may be reducing the severity of vertigo, but it does not prevent me from going through that horrible spinning sensation for several hours. He also prescribed an oral steroid for six days. I do not think it worked either, and such side effects as difficulty in sleeping bothered me a lot. When I kept complaining about my symptoms and asking about different medication, he began to believe that I was "depressed." He prescribed an anti-depressant. That was when I stopped seeing him. Yes, I might be depressed, but with a good reason. I thought it was wrong to focus on my depression without trying to fix the fundamental problem that was causing this depression (= Meniere's disease).

My current doctor told me to take valium on the daily basis. I was afraid of taking too much valium because I was aware of its habit-forming nature. But she said 2mg, twice a day would not make me addicted. So I started to take valium everyday even when I did not have any symptom. But this strategy failed, too. sigh... I still have tinnitus, fullness, and vertigo. I have an attack almost every other day.

Please feel free to share your comments and opinions.

Flying and Meniere's Disease

As I previously said, I was controlling this disease pretty well until last December. I was taking a diuretic (lasix) and following a low sodium diet. Though I often ate out, when I cooked at home I tried to use as little salt as possible if none.

During the winter vacation last December, I flew to Japan, which is my home country. At the first night in Japan, I had an attack for the first time since March 2009. Since then, I have been having attacks frequently. It seems that flying triggered this coming back of the symptoms. I have been taking the same medication and following a low sodium diet, but I am not able to stop recurring attacks. Certainly, flying changed something. Since then, I flew three times for business. After two out the three flights, I had attacks either next day or two days after I flew. For a while, I do not have any plan to fly (well, I am trying to avoid flying as much as possible). I am just very scared of flying now.