Tag: vertigo

Words on Wednesday Night

On By WendyIn Meniere's Disease5 Comments
I'm a Pet Bed.

I’ve found out that my pet’s believe I’m their very own pet bed.

As soon as I get comfortable, if I’m on the couch, or in the bed, it doesn’t matter.  If I curl up, Max (the huge cat with many toes), and Sandy (the lovable old dog) will soon be climbing on top of me to find a comfy bed of their own.  It’s really very sweet.  Until, I need to go to the bathroom in a hurry and I’m weighed down by about 40 pounds of animals!  : )

Something very odd happened yesterday.

I was in my husband’s office upstairs, I was standing beside his desk talking to him and had my hand on his desk to keep my balance.  I started to turn and my body decided it was just going to keep going backwards.  Stuart quickly reached out and grabbed me before I hit the floor, and I ended up in his lap.  (where I had intended to go in the first place.)  But for some reason I just busted out laughing. I thought this was just so funny.  The sensation of me falling backwards for no real reason, other than my screwy balance, just made me laugh and laugh.

Either I’m going crazy, or I’m taking things much lighter than I used to.   Of course, if I had hit the floor I probably wouldn’t have thought it was nearly as funny.

small update and Sauerkraut recipe

On By WendyIn Gluten-Free, Medical Tests, Meniere's Disease, Recipe, whole nutrition1 Comment

I have an appointment with Dr. Gray on January 28th at noon.

I don’t know why all of a sudden they were able to get me in sooner, but I’m glad.

We’ll find out what’s going on with the Cerebral Spinal Fluid Pressure.  Hopefully, she will be able to get something straight.  Even leveling things out a little would help a lot.  3-4 attacks a week are driving me crazy.  (as you all know.)

On a side note.  I made Sauerkraut today….well I started the making of Sauerkraut today.  I thought I had pictures of it from the last time I made it but I can’t find them.  : (  So I didn’t take any today.  But I will tell you what I did.  It is so easy!!  (especially if you have a food processor) *this recipe was inspired by the recipe for Raw Sauerkraut in the Whole Life Nutrition Cookbook.

Sauerkraut

  • 1 head of Cabbage
  • 1 – 2 Tablespoons of Sea Salt (I use 1, but the original recipe called for 2)

Peel off a few of the out leaves of the cabbage head.  Save these you will use them later.  Chop the head into small enough pieces to fit in your food processor. (be sure to remove and discard the stalk. I really like the center of the stalk, I always just gobble it up.)

Slice up the cabbage in your food processor with your slicing blade. (if you don’t have a food processor you can do this by hand, but it will take a while, you have to cut it up really small.)  Transfer the cabbage to a bowl and toss with the salt.

Here’s the really hard part if you don’t have a food processor.  Remove the slicing blade from the food processor and put in your little plastic blade.  Return cabbage to food processor in small batches just smashing it up and making it all juicy.  (if you don’t have a food processor you need to just keep smashing he cabbage with a mallet until you get a lot of the juice out.  Of course, this is a great way to get your frustrations out.)

Just spoon your juicy cabbage into a clean jar, and cover with those outer leaves you saved from the beginning.  Press the mixture down so the is some juice covering the leaves.  This won’t be hard.  Keep in a dark dry place for 3-7 days, I like to keep mine in my pantry.  (I do put the lid on the jar, but I don’t tighten it.)  Every day you need to press it down some more so even more juice will cover those leaves.  (eventually the leaves will start to just fall apart, don’t worry about it.)  The original recipe says to start tasting it after about 3 days, mine tastes nasty that soon.  Just smell it, if it smell like sauerkraut, then taste it.  If it taste like you like, then put it in the refrigerator the slow/stop the fermentation process.  If you get a funky scum on the top of your sauerkraut, just spoon it off.

I use a wooden pestle from a mortar and pestle that I have to press my mixture down every day.  Since I don’t use this mortar and pestle any more, I use it exclusively for this, now it smells like pickles.  : )  If you used a pestle made from a different material, or perhaps a mallet, you probably wouldn’t have this problem.

They do make crocks just for making sauerkraut, and I’ve seen much more complicated recipes, but I’ve never tasted better sauerkraut.

I may make it a different way some time, I may even get a fermenting crock so I can make more than one head of cabbage at a time.  But for now, this method does well for me, I just start a new jar before the one in the fridge gets empty.

(If I find those pictures, I’ll post one.  Maybe I will take a picture of the jar I have started at least so you can see what it looks like.)

Reading other Blogs about Meniere’s Disease

On By WendyIn Meniere's Disease2 Comments
Sandy Exhausted from Playing the Wii while waiting for me to stop reading Blogs.

Yesterday and today I have been catching up on some reading…no not book reading…blog reading.  I decided to search for more blogs about Meniere’s Disease and just see what other people are posting about.

Of course, there really aren’t that many blogs about Meniere’s since there aren’t that many of us, and not all of us decide to write about our experiences.

I found that some people like to write a lot about everything they can find out about Meniere’s.  The latest developments, other diseases that might go along with it….  But most of you are just like me.  We write about how this disease is treating us, and I’ve found that it treats people differently.

The treatments seem to be as varied as the patients.

So many people are so excited about this new vestibular device that is being talked about.  I don’t know why, but I’m not yet.  I just think that it’s too early.  I’m so happy that they are experimenting and studying and doing something positive that may help us some day…but I’m just so miserable right now that it just seems so out of reach for me.

I get such hope from reading other people’s experiences.  Reading that a Meniett Device worked for someone, and a Gent injection worked for someone else.  Others get along pretty well with just a low sodium diet and supplements. Then there is the girl who has a cochlear implant and a service dog…I find her so inspirational.

For the past few days I’ve been living bed to couch again.  I can barely hear, and I feel like an attack is about to start at any moment.  I took a bath tonight and thought I was going to barf in the tub.  My husband rushed in with the Valium and Phenergan, and I got calmed down.  He finished giving me my bath and I crawled into bed.  I’m not complaining.  This is just the facts of my life right now.

My husband talked to Dr. Kaylie yesterday and he said he is going to talk to Dr. Gray about getting me back in to check on the patches.  We are supposed to hear from Dr. Gray by Wednesday.  I’m sure something can be done.  After all, I felt so much better immediately after the blood patch.  I know it can be better.

I’m adding to my list of blogs that I read, please take the time to check some of them out.  You may find a new friend out there.  I know I have.

Huh? What did you say?

On By WendyIn Meniere's Disease1 Comment
It snowed here on Dec. 26th!

I didn’t have an appropriate picture for this post, so I decided to just share a picture from our Snow Day.  It’s almost all gone now.

I so can not hear right now.  It is so aggravating to go from one week of being able to hear pretty darn good (at least out of one ear), and then the next week I can barely hear at all.

It also makes me very uneasy because I know that normally when I can’t hear I’m going to have a full blown Meniere’s attack some time soon.  I may be able to put it off for a while with medication and such, but it will probably happen within a week or so.  Then I will be able to hear again.  That just does not make sense to me.  Why can I hear so much better right after I have vertigo and puke my guts out?

(More stuff that is poopy graphic and you may not want to read.)  Well, the diarrhea is still going strong. 5 times so far.  Today about 2 hours after eating my lunch, I saw it all in the toilet.  My doctor once asked me how did I know it was what I just ate….well, let’s see…it is in the same form  as when it went in.  This time I had lettuce, I haven’t eaten lettuce in at least a week, it was very visible.  It’s also bright yellow.  It looks like it’s bile.  I looked up on line what yellow stools could mean.  On About.com it said that it often means you have GERD and are passing food through your system too fast.  Well, it does sound like I’m passing food through way too fast.  (can not understand how I’m gaining weight…but we’ll worry about that later.)  You know, my doctors haven’t even asked me what color it usually is.  They have asked if it’s black, or if I see blood, but that’s all.  It’s just so confusing.

It makes it harder to deal with a second illness when you have Meniere’s.  Numerous times I’ve had cancel appointments or tests that have been scheduled because I was having an attack, or I was recovering from one I just had.  (I don’t know about anyone else, but I’m pretty worthless the day after an attack.  I just have to sleep.)

So I didn’t get the Breath Tests done, I didn’t get the up CT scan done, I didn’t get the scope of the upper GI track done…..I do have the scope rescheduled for the 8th of January.  But, heck, I would probably have known what was wrong with my gut by now if I didn’t have Meniere’s to deal with too.

Stuart keeps saying, let’s concentrate on one thing at a time.  But that’s pretty hard when you are running to the bathroom all the time, and keep growing out of your clothes.

Hey, I got off the couch today.  We went had lunch at Pei Wei, to the grocery store, and went to one of the biggest Thrift Stores I know of.

The Durham Rescue Mission Bargain Center used to be a car dealership.  I love shopping there.  Today and I got 2 sweaters that are long.  I seem to have so many sweaters that show my middle when I move.  I think I must have bought them when waistlines where high, and now that they are lower my tops don’t seem to be long enough.  (however, I do not where low riders.  I would just have one big muffin top.  Don’t you think that’s just disgusting when you see that?)

I also bought 2 pretty plates to photograph my food on.  I only have white dishes, and I think my photographs are getting pretty boring.  I was looking for a pretty bowl to photograph things like soup in, all of my bowls are so deep it’s hard to get a good picture.  However, I have to admit, if I was being judged for plating my food, like they do on Iron Chef, I would lose miserably.  LOL  The truth is, I really should be able to set up better photographs, after all that was one of my specialties in college.  (I majored in Art with a specialization in painting and photography.  Look how much I use it now.  hahaha)

We also got the game CLUE.  I hope all the pieces are there.  Stuart found this thing on-line that tells you how to take 4 games, and make a whole bunch more.  The 4 games are Trivial Pursuit, CLUE, Scrabble, and Monopoly.  You use the different pieces on different boards and just mix it all up and make new games.  I’m looking forward to seeing what he comes up with.  However, we have to get another Scrabble game, I don’t know what happened to mine.

We bought all of this for less than $10!  Isn’t that cool?

So that’s a day in the life of Wendy, I’m glad you could join me.

Oh What a Night! (and not in a good way)

On By WendyIn Meniere's Disease5 Comments

I had a horrible attack last night.

All day yesterday I was following a weird diet because I was supposed to have a hydrogen Breath test today (this checks to see if you are digesting your food properly), then I was supposed to have a breath test for Lactose Intolerance and Fructose Intolerance.  So all day I couldn’t have dairy, soy, fruit, most veggies (I could have overly cooked or canned Asparagus, Green Beans, Spinach, Carrots, and baby Okra.  Ewww, canned veggies.)  I could have lot’s of carbs, but I had to limit them to 30grams per meal.  It was crazy.  I could eat meat, but I don’t usually eat that much meat.  So yesterday I had more meat than I usually eat, and some canned veggies…I know I said ewwww, before but…ewwww.  The Asparagus was slimy and had too much sodium, the Spinach tasted like dirt, I didn’t even try anything else.  Just too icky.

Around 8:15pm I started to feel a little spinny.  Stuart got me a Valium and I thought that would do it, but then it started getting worse, I took a Phenergan, and a Diamox (this is the pill that lowers your pressure), I thought perhaps since I had more sodium than usual yesterday it might have spiked my pressure.  Well, I think taking that pill may have been a huge mistake.

The spinning got much worse, and no amount of trying to keep myself calm was working.  Then came the heat, I know when you start to get really hot, I’ll probably be throwing up soon.  Well, first diarrhea hit.  Yes, I was spinning, about to toss my cookies and I had to run to the bathroom.  Thank God for my husband and my walker.  I made it back to the couch, and started throwing up.  For over 2.5 hours I was throwing up, long past the point of anything being left in my stomach.  And the pain…oh the stomach pain.  The burning and gnawing feeling, and all my muscles working in over time. I was shaking uncontrollably.  I was to the point where I was choking, and couldn’t breathe at some points. Everything was pushing out, and I couldn’t take a breath in.  I hate to admit this, but I couldn’t hold my water at one point when I was throwing up, all the muscles were just not working like they should.

I realized last night how much this would kill me if I had to watch my husband go through it.  He works so hard to make me as comfortable as possible, and allow me to still keep some of my dignity.  He keeps a clean bucket for me to throw up in and switches out the moment there is a break so I won’t have to smell it.  He even puts a little mouth wash in it in case some of the smell lingers I won’t smell it.  He cleans me up, keeps wet wash cloths close by, and holds me tight and lets me squeeze his hand when things get bad.  When I wet myself he simply put a pad under me and when things calmed down he helped me get cleaned up.  He even puts in the Phenergan suppositories for me.  Every time this happens I am so amazed at how well he handles it, you can tell it’s tearing him apart that he can’t make it stop and help me more, but he tries so hard to do everything he can, and tells me that he is just grateful that he can be here for me.  I don’t know what I’d do without him.  I feel like he does so much for me, and I’m just dead weight.  I feel like I’m worthless, I just don’t know how to make things better.

I know, I have hope that things will get better.  I will once again be able to get off of this darn couch.  But today, I just feel awful, and I’m wallowing a little.

I realized the other day that if/when they do make me better, I don’t have any skills to do anything.  I thought about going back to school, but I’ve been out for so long that none of my credits would count now, and since I haven’t been working they can’t take my experiences there into account.  I just don’t know what I would do with myself.  But I would like the opportunity to find out.

Sorry this is such a scattered post.  I usually feel better than this the day after an attack, but I barely have the energy to stand up, and can’t think about walking without my walker.  (of course, I’m still running to the bathroom, but there is so very little coming out.)  I’m pretty miserable today.  I hurt all over, my head hurts, my chest, stomach, bowels….I just feel bad.

So lot’s of Gatorade, and bland foods.  Snuggling on the couch with my dear sweet dog, and sometimes the cat joins us too.  Perhaps I’ll finish the book I’ve been reading.  But for now, I think I’ll take a nap.

Thanks for listening to me rant.  I feel better already just getting it all off my chest.

Vertigo

On By WendyIn Meniere's Disease3 Comments

Well I guess the title says it all.   I had a vertigo attack yesterday.

Dr. Gray isn’t sure whether my CSF (Cerebral Spinal Fluid) pressure is to high now, or if the blood patches didn’t take and it’s too low.

When the world started to spin yesterday I took a Valium and a Phenergan immediately.  Then I decided I’d try one of the pills that she gave me to reduce the CFS pressure.  The spinning lasted for a little while, but it never got really bad (by that I mean I didn’t throw up).  Every time I would close my eyes the world would spin much faster and I would start to feel sick.  At one point I got all hot, the world was spinning…I just knew I was going to see my lunch at any moment.  But I really tried to stay calm.  I stared at the corner of the ceiling and willed it to be still.  I just concentrated on staying calm and not throwing up.

Usually, I get very upset when all this starts and start to freak out.  I did get very upset at first when right after I took the pill to lower my CSF pressure my husband looked at me and said, “I hope your pressure isn’t already to low because that could really make things a lot worse if it is.”  I was so scared, I just burst into tears.  He felt so bad.

During this attack I kept repeating the words “calm”, “peace”, and “relax”.  I felt much more at ease.  Even if things had gotten all out of control and I’d been throwing up like crazy, I think trying to keep my head about me and staying calm helped me feel better about the situation.

Yes, I’m still scared.  I’m tired of being poked and prodded.

I went to see the Digestive Health doctors last week, and I have to go through a whole other battery of tests.  The first one was supposed to happen today, but I had to cancel it.  But I am so overwhelmed by everything that is going on with me and the Meniere’s I just couldn’t handle anything else right now.

That dang ticking sound is back.  It is driving me crazy.  I know the biggest reason it bothers me is that it sounds like it is coming from outside of my head.  All the other noises I can tell are just coming from my ears.  This noise tings, and it has no rhythm, it’s just arbitrary.  I feel like it’s a frequency I might be able to hear, and that make s it even worse.  I keep thinking maybe Stuart can’t hear it because of all the other noises he can hear, but then I put in ear plugs to keep it out and it’s still there.  I had such a hard time sleeping last night, thanks to the mysterious tinging sound.  (and we all know how important sleep is to us.)

Thanks again for all the support and for just listening to me rant.  I really appreciate all the comments that you leave me.  It makes me happy to know that there are people out there who understand, and people who are pulling for me.  I’m very humbled and grateful for all of you.

"The most common way people give up their power is by thinking they don’t have any". Alice Walker

On By WendyIn Life, Meniere's DiseaseLeave a comment

I saw this quote by Alice Walker, and I thought about how much I believed I had no power over anything in my life when the Meniere’s was bad.

I was so dependent on my husband for EVERYTHING!  From paying all the bills, to helping me get to the bathroom.  I had no choice for anything in my life…but that’s not exactly true is it?  I could have completely given up and just packed it all in.  I could have stopped trying to get out of bed.  I could have stopped caring that I had to be taken care of and just given in, but I fought it every step of the way.  Sometimes, it hurt my husband, but most of the time when I really needed him I let him help, but when I didn’t need help, I let him know in no uncertain terms.  (My biggest regret is that I wasn’t easier on him.)

There were a few times when I thought it would easier just to give up and take a bottle of pills and stop being the burden that I felt like I was.  Those are the times I gave up all my power.  But then I’d realize that just because this disease had control of my body, it didn’t have control of my mind.  So, I worked as hard as I could to find a way to live a better life with Meniere’s.  I never thought that I would have the chance of getting rid of the vertigo, and living a mostly normal life again.

Ups and Downs of the Weekend

On By WendyIn Meniere's Disease2 Comments

Saturday was an ok day for me.  I had a bad attitude, but other than that, I was able to go out to lunch with my husband, and run some errands.  We even ordered our little Organic Turkey Breast from Earth Fare, for Thanksgiving.  I’m pretty proud of myself that I really think I can pull off having a Thanksgiving dinner without getting off the couch.  More about that in my next post.

Me and Sandy

Sunday, was not a good day.  I know it was because I couldn’t sleep Saturday night so I was all out of whack on Sunday, but knowing why, and having it happen, really doesn’t help that much does it?  I didn’t get to sleep until after 4:30am.  Then my dear dog woke me up around 11am.  She really doesn’t bother me much, she usually goes to Stuart for everything when I’m asleep because he will wake up and give her things, I often don’t even hear her.  However, I was sleeping a little too late for her, and she decided she had to check on me.  She cuddled up right at my face, she was so cute, but I really wasn’t awake enough to get up.  But I did anyway.  Straight to the couch.

My hubby made me breakfast, but I was still hungry.  But I was also very dizzy.  He said he was going upstairs to take a shower, so I decided to go upstairs too, just in case something happened he would be able to hear me.  I ended up crawling up the stairs, and hobbling to the bed with much help from Stuart.  I took a Valium and Phenergan.  After about 20mins, I still felt bad, so I used a Phenergan suppository too.

I was so sleepy, but every time I closed my eyes the world would start to spin.  Does anyone else ever have that happen when you are really tired?  I don’t feel well even with my eyes open, but at least the world isn’t going round and round, then as soon as I close my eyes I feel like everything is moving.  It’s hard….I’m so sleepy yet I’m afraid to close my eyes.

I was still hungry though, if I’m hungry my symptoms get worse.  So Stuart brought me half of a sweet potato.  It helped.  He then left to start grilling chicken.  I had left over Wild Rice Blend I’d made in the crock pot the day before, and I made a pot of black beans over night on Saturday night.  We also had broccoli we bought the day before.  It was starting to smell very good downstairs, but thankfully, I dozed off.  And slept for a couple of hours.

So, the great lunch my darling husband was making, became my dinner.  It was very good.  I was feeling much better, but I was still suffering from some pretty serious disequilibrium.

Today, the disequilibrium is still there, but I am hearing better out of my left ear than I have in months.  What’s up with that?  I even did without my amplifier when Stuart and I were having a chat over lunch.  That was nice.

My hearing is still pretty tinny, and it’s not picking up all frequencies just right, but I can understand what my husband is saying.  I love that.