Dizziness mostly solved. Hoping this will help others!
Hi everyone, I believe I've solved my dizziness and I'm excited to share to help others! Some background:
- Dizziness started 3 years ago
- Symptoms included rocking/swaying dizziness, similar to being on a boat or standing on a floating dock
- Symptoms would occasionally be unnoticeable if I was distracted a lot, but otherwise it was pretty much constant anytime I was walking or standing
- Also experienced weird visual distortions during the worst of it and brain fog
- Saw many doctors over the years, blood tests, head and neck MRI, vestibular PT, etc. Was never given a clear diagnosis nor did anything seem to help
- I've had very tight neck and head muscles for years now, likely due to forward head posture and chronic stress/anxiety from past trauma
Fast forward to about a month ago, I got a really bad cold and was taking ibuprofin and tylenol for about 10 days. I usually don't take these types of meds and just tough it out, but this was a rough cold. After a few days on these meds I noticed my dizziness was less noticeable. I also noticed a lack of tension in my neck that I honestly didn't even realize was there previously. This gave me the idea that this dizziness could be due to muscle tension, which was either pulling on the vestibular system in weird ways, compressing arteries, or compressing nerves. I'm still not sure exactly what was going on internally, but I was sure that muscular tension was the root cause.
Once I stopped taking the meds, the dizziness came back but wasn't as severe. I also noticed the tension in my neck was returning. I decided to spend a couple hours a day doing various relaxing techniques such as meditation, deep breathing, and somatic work (somatic work is essentially focusing on how the sensations in your body are connected to emotions. I've been going to somatic therapy for a couple years now so I've become quite good at this). All of this amounted to muscles in my neck (and other parts of my body) slowly releasing. To be honest this process has been very time consuming and pretty difficult, but 100% worth it in the end.
I kid you not, I have literally felt muscles "unlock" around the back of my head and neck area over the past month. It's a crazy sensation, almost like they were permanently tight and then they were suddenly released. I have way more flexibility in my head and neck area, and the muscles actually feel soft and malleable instead of firm. My brain fog is also significantly improved. It's almost like a vice was released around my head and neck that was somehow not that apparent to me before. Like I knew I had muscle tension in those areas, but my body had become so accustom to it that it forgot what "normal" felt like.
My dizziness has gotten probably 95% better over the past month. I still notice it if I do certain exercises in the gym that exacerbate the muscle tension, specifically lateral/front raises and overhead press, so I stopped doing those exercises temporarily. I'm trying to learn more about how to strengthen the right muscles to prevent this moving forward, but for now I'm pretty happy with the progress. Might even go to a regular PT now that I have a much better idea of what's going on.
As I'm writing this I realize this might all sound a little crazy lol but hopefully it resonates with some of you. I'm happy to answer any questions or clarify anything :)