- Periods of unsteadiness or a feeling of the ground being unstable. (10)
- A feeling of rocking or swaying, or feeling like you are veering to the side when walking. (10)
- A feeling of ‘fullness’, ‘cloudiness’, ‘fogginess’, or ‘heaviness’ of the head.(10)
- Dizziness in response to particular movements, such as turning head from side to side, getting up from a chair, looking up, bending over, lying down etc.. (10)
- Tinnitus (ringing, buzzing or hissing sound on one or both ears) (8)
- Visual disturbances (sensitivity to bright light or to motion stimuli; episodically out of focus) (8)
- Numbness, tingling or ‘electrical’ sensations in hands, feet, face or scalp (often one-sided) (3) (Though I've had this in the past as as stress symptom)
- Momentary dizziness or internal ‘shift’ sensations that last for a couple of seconds. (5)
- Nausea (7) (More when it started, but on and off)
- Headaches (6)
- Feeling hot or flushed (2)
- Wobbly legs (8)
- Tightness or clenching of the jaw. (7)
- Heart palpitations or missed heart beats (3) (No more than usual with stress/anxiety disorder from the past)
- Body or situations may at times feel different or unreal (4)
- Frequent fatigue (7)
On a scale of 1 (lowest) to 10 (most accurately describes) .... mine are above in ( )
I was pretty shocked when I saw that list, like you. And unlike most other "inner ear disorders" or things of that nature, there aren't lots of major symptoms that I simply don't have. I have all of these listed, 100% of the primary ones.
Can I ask, has yours felt more constant or fleeting? I think what has really taken me off guard about this is how constant it's been.
I have to admit, there does seem to be a physical element to this. It's an always-on condition that may fluctuate a bit, but it's got a much more constant feel than most of my stress/anxiety symptoms from the past.
I'm also about 8 years into knowing a great deal about stress/anxiety disorders... and have made great progress. So, to be knocked down this late in the process was quite surprising, I admit. That said, I don't feel like I panicked about it early on... I rolled with it OK. I think it became disturbing to me when it stayed around a month or so without real improvement. Then my brain started to get involved with the "when will this go, will it go?" type questions.
I saw an ENT last week. He didn't have much to say. Suggested a hearing test or MRI. My hearing is fine. I've done self-test with apps and I use my ears for my living. (Audio producer for a TV network.) I'd know if there was an issue there immediately. Maybe I'll get an MRI some day, but... I've never heard of it helping a case like this.
I think for me it's about now shifting my mindset to live with this for as long as it needs to be around. I'm so used to stress sx clearing up in a timely manner these days due to the progress I've made. But, this seems to need time. I do believe I overdid it for a couple of months, and this actually came on when I was doing heavy weightlifting.
(Was doing an inverted lift and stood up and got dizzy) So, there's some logic in the notion that the body may need time to sort this out.
IMO... PPDS is just a title. It's not rare. This is extremely common. (Dizzy/balance issues that can't be explained.) It's just few people have classified it as an actual title.
Jim Folk over at anxiety center has been talking about this for years, and how it's a primary symptom... maybe one of the ones they hear the most in their polls/questions.
So, the occurrence of this isn't unusual... but finding folks like yourself who are experiencing it and understand that it's not something "broken," rather a process to work through is rare. So, it's good we can progress through this and hopefully others can learn from our trials as well.
