In October (just after our vacation to the beach where Diya fell off the balcony), I got a cold. During my cold my ears started to hurt a lot and my right ear was totally clogged! I looked up every home remedy and I tried them all (just about)... but it stayed clogged and I couldn't hear out of my right ear at all. I figured it would just go away, but it never did. One day I noticed that I was losing my balance a lot more. I knew the ear can mess with your balance so I figured that was what it was.
I started having daily balance problems. Then, after a couple of days, I got my first experience with vertigo. It was horrible... I was nauseous, vomiting and my whole body was spinning while I was laying still (and it lasted 6 hours!!!). After that I decided it was time to go to the doctor. We went in the morning to an ENT and he prescribed some antibiotics. I took those for a few days while still having vertigo just about every evening. During that time I tried out quite a few ENT doctors. One doctor said my vertigo was from using my computer... I was looking up my symptoms online and I have EVERY symptom of Meniere's Disease, but no doctor even mentioned that. At that point I knew that I needed to find a really good ENT. I was having vertigo at least once a day and it was no fun!
Adam remembered about a great ENT that works at a hospital next to our house (he used him for a physical once). He has many inventions that are used around the world and is pretty famous (and is the Prime Minister's ENT!), so we wanted to give him a try! He had another office, so we went to that. I met with him and after I told him my story he said: "I think you have Meniere's Disease. Let's do some tests to confirm and see." I did some ear tests and he said all of my symptoms and everything else was completely typical of Meniere's Disease, and he diagnosed me with that.
He put me on some medication that completely stopped my vertigo!! It was AWESOME!!!! I also had to start a Low-Sodium diet (which is really hard to do!!) But, after a month, I started having vertigo again. This time I was having vertigo episodes anywhere from one to three times a day! They would last anywhere between 1 hour and 6 hours! Anyway, to make a long story short, the doctor would try another medicine, and it would work and then after a while it would stop working again. The only thing that did work were the steroids. He didn't want to put me on them for over a week (because of the side effects) but he also wanted to see if they worked. Well, they did work, so after trying the oral steroids twice and having positive results from those, the next thing to try was steroid injections in my ears (it doesn't have the side effects that taking oral steroids does).... to do that, they had to put a tube/grommet in my ear.
So, on Monday I had the surgery! Here I am right before the surgery :)
This was a minor surgery, but it was my 3rd surgery in South Asia! Crazy hunh? (The other two were c-sections). We "tried out" a new hospital for this surgery. It's the one my ENT doctor works out of and it's only one Metro stop from our house, so it was really convenient. We were really impressed with it (for the most part :))
They took me from my "cubicle" above in "Day Care" (for outpatients) and wheeled me into the pre-op/post-op room. Adam wasn't allowed in, so he took a picture from the door.
These are all "cell phone pictures" so they're not that great :) but here they are wheeling me in....
This picture makes me look like I don't have any fingers, so it makes me laugh!
I was in a "pre-op" room for a while (one surgery before me got complicated), so I had to wait around for a while (about 4 hours)... Luckily I had a fun nurse friend who got my book out of my room so I could read while I waited. We also watched some TV together - it was pretty fun :)
Eventually I went in for surgery. I only had Local Anesthesia, but they did sedate me, so I only remember the first few minutes of being in the operating room. The surgery itself only lasted about 10 minutes. I hung out in post-op for a little while and then they wheeled me back into my cubicle in "day care".
They brought me a Juice Box in Day Care.... I thought that was funny :)
So I got my first steroid injection during the surgery, so the next day I went to my doctor's office and got another injection.... It HURTS!!!! At first I thought it was something that Adam could do at home... I didn't realize that it involved lot of special equipment and a NEEDLE! haha! :)
In this picture you can see the tube.... It's a little gross looking :) You may not be able to tell, but my eardrum is really swollen!
These are all "phone pictures" so they're not that great, but you can see the tube again in this picture :) It is really weird having a hole in my eardrum!!! If I have the hiccups or blow my nose, I can feel air moving through my ear! It's crazy!
I had another steroid injection in my ear yesterday (ouch!!). Since the surgery I have not had any vertigo!!!! Praise G0d!!! My doctor is out of town the rest of the week, so I'll resume the injections on Monday. Please pray that the vertigo doesn't come back between now and then!!! We're going to our friend Mayank's wedding this weekend!!! I'd love not have vertigo for the drive there & back and for the wedding!!!
Thanks everyone for praying!!!!
