Health Stuff… If you’ve ever gone through it you probably dread the conversations you get. So many people mean well and try to help. You get all sorts of diet, treatment suggestions, news and magazine clippings…. it does get tiresome.

I have added to my diagnosis in the last few months. I’ve been diagnosed for the last two years with Meniere’s Disease, but in the last several months have received a diagnose of “likely” seronegative rheumatoid arthritis. I had been having joint pain all over since October (which was a rough month for flu bugs at our house.) I can’t help but think that may have triggered all the problems. Right now they’re trying to regulate medicines, but I’m on the prednasone, plaquenil, a couple of allergy medicines (as that is a trigger for the Meniere’s…. (sigh) and a myriad of more conversations I can have where I get recommended foods that are antiinflammatory. I know – they are trying to help, but good grief… sometimes you just need to try one thing at a time and see what happens. (Unfortunately many of the treatments take a while to take effect, or have side effects that are scary.)

May/June was a very active spinning stretch. I had about 5 episodes through a stretch of a few weeks. It seemed like a spin every 3 days. I think the start of it was a missing of the allergy shot due to a fever and then several necessary visits into the attic to identify a leak location. So, I’ve had it all lately vertigo (although it was “mild” vertigo – I didn’t have the MAD spinning that I have experienced before…)

I can’t help but wonder if the two diseases are related for me. Both of them seem to have inflammation as a symptom and autoimmune related causes. I guess my immune system is just working too well…

Here’s a weird note. For some 20 years I’ve avoided milk like a vampire avoids the sun because of several experiences of terrible stomach upset after milk. For the last 15 years I really had wished I could drink milk and resolved to try it again when I had a free afternoon (because I new I’d feel like I had a stomach full of knives afterwards.) Well. Sunday evening I took a chance and poured a skim milk, added chocolate (great cold drink for a late spring (Hot) evening btw..) No bad effects. So, every night this week I’ve done likewise and have been on a roll energy wise (I’m thinking that may play a part in my energy of late as I’ve been on this low dose prednisone for quite a while so I doubt it’s that.) If anything my stomach/digestion seems to be perking along better than it has been over the last several months.

So…. that’s weird. I’m assuming that before maybe it was the fat (I seem to recall that it was something like 2% skim and I think what we have is …. well best described as 0% skim.) Who knows, maybe my stomache chemistry has changed?

So, by the time I was at my ENT appointment I was still having the pressure and roaring in my ear (always the right ear.) I was still off balance and dizzy. Especially after car rides. It was hard to watch motion. (Sitting in a lobby facing the street was almost torturous.) I went through several tests at the ENT including a hearing test and was Diagnosed with Meniere’s Disease. He said that the hearing loss matched the classic “loss curve” for Meniere’s and he prescribed my with Alprazolam (Xanax) and also wrote a prescription for a diuretic that I would use daily.

He also prescribed a reduction in salt intake. This seemed to run counter to my thinking that my allergies were the main cause. During this time I had started logging EVERYTHING. Weather, eating, drinking, salt in each food, portions, medicines, EVERYTHING I could think to write I put in my log. There seemed to be NO correlation between salt intake and my symptoms. I was still feeling pretty lousy.

Around New Years I started slipping back to less frequent allergy shots and in mid January I went to a weekly routine. During this time my symptoms started getting better. I started noticing that about 24 hours after my shot on Monday I’d start feeling pressure in my ear and if that continued by Thursday I might be a bit dizzy, but it cleared up a bit after (in time for my next shot.)

At the NEXT ENT appointment I described this correlation and he seemed to agree that we might have a finger on the pulse of the problem with my allergies. So, he prescribed Prednasone in case I needed it for a BAD allergic reaction.