Dizziness & Tension! End of my tether!!

[pinkpiglet]

I am at the end of my tether with this diziness now!

I posted a few weeks back saying that my GP had said that I just need to go home and get on with it! Some people suffer with dizziness and that the top and bottom of it. I am one of these people apparantly and there is no reason and no cure!!

My GP tested my blood for sugars, iron and thyroid and carried out an ECG, all came back clear and he said that from the dizziness I describe, there is nothing else it could be.

I just want to scream!!!

What i really want to do is get on with my life and fight this thing, but for anyone who has suffered this themselves you will know that its not so easy. Dizziness is not something you can ignore, and it as an affect on my whole life. I am a mum to a 3 year old boy, i work-part time and have a home to keep. My dizziness is so bad that it drives me to tears. I cannot escape it and it is crippling me. I feel depressed but i know that if the dizziness stopped i wouldnt feel half as bad.
I have never felt so desperate when writing a thread but because I am so dizzy I cannot concentrate on what i want to say.

I am all for self help when it comes to anxiety/deprssion/panic/stress but I do not know any ways in which I can begin to take control of this.

My dizziness is worse when i sit down, so it makes it impossible for me to relax or unwind, infact, it makes me more uptight and more depressed. To sit and play a game with my boy is agony as i am so dizzy.

I have started to smack my head with the palm of my hand as if I am trying to bash it away....HOW EMBARRASSING EH??? I dont know if it is frustration or what it is!! please help.

Sorry if this thread is mumbled & sorry I have not replied to any of your posts for a while but I cannot concentrate for this thing!!!!!:weep:

[pinkpiglet]

Just to add that I have just found some meds that my GP gave me several months ago to help with the dizziness. They didnt help at all but I am going to give them another go, try them for a week or so, see if i notice any improvement. I need to try anything as I am so desperate. Bit unsure as the meds are to help with Menieres disease and I have never been tested for this. We will see if they work or not. In the meantime I will sit tight and try not to chop my head off!!!! JOKE!!!!

[miles]

I know exactly how you feel!

I had this same dizziness since June 09, 24/7, and only since Feb/March am I better.

At first the Docs and consultants did all the tests, and thought it was Vestibular Neuritis (Labyrinthitus without the hearing loss). This can bring on anxiety and depression.

I was given five types of strong drugs to help, but none worked.

In the end, a very experienced doctor threw all my meds away, said that it was anxiety and this is also causing depression, gave me 10mg Citalopram for two weeks, then up to 20mg until now.....

The dizziness is gone, I feel loads better about 90% better.....

Get yourself checked out, but I think you have anxiety and depression, and you will get better and feel normal once you have a good treatment plan.

You'll find that until you get medication, you'll feel horrible and no doubt constantly check yourself for symptoms, and have endless worrying thoughts.

That's called somatic hypervigillance.... part of anxiety. It means that you focus on sensations within your body that you wouldn't normally notice... so you worry and increase your anxiety in a vicious circle.

I couldn't relax, sit, lay anything, I felt awful and dizzy....
Now I'm back working, enjoying life etc. Still not quite there.

Get to the doctors, explain, and if they offer you something like Citalopram, go home and take it. read the threads on here about how it feels crap for a few weeks... then you start gradually feeling stronger and better.

good look, I know what you're going through, you'll be OK x

Miles

[spaced]

ok the drugs the doc gave you are they called phrochlorperzine other wise know as stemetil I took these for a long time when I suffered from terrible dizzyness. They did work but I think it can time for them to kick in so they may be worth another try. As for the menieres if your worried ask the doc to send you for some tests I had then done.

[pinkpiglet]

Thanks for your replies guys! Really reassuring to have your support!!

Spaced- The meds are called cinnaraizine, i have taken stemitil for a few years as when i was taking fluoxetine it combatted the symptoms of dizziness back then. However, they only work to relieve periods of dizziness. These new meds are to be taken three times a day as the dizziness is consistant rght now (it never goes away). They dont seem to work very well but maybe i should give them more time. They are for meniers disease so i don understand why he as given them to me but I am so desperate that i am just going to try them again

Miles- I am quite sure you are correct but I have never felt so physically ill with anxiety in the past. I am so drained, i am drip white all the time, I have dark puddles under my eyes and I am dizzy day and night. I cant help thinking that my GP as missed something, and i am now dying from cancer or something. If i didnt have my three year old son and a home I think I would take to my bed 24/7 (infact i know this is what i would do) Instead I have to battle forth and get on with it depsite the dizziness. I will make an appointment with my GP though and see what he thinks. I am reluctant to go back on meds as we are currently trying for baby No2 and I am worried about the affects these drugs might take. I am glad you are feeling much better. :yesyes: Well done you!!!

Thanks again for replies xx

[miles]

Hi Pinkpiglet,

I too was really physically ill, and one of the main symptoms was a total loss of colour, I looked like a zombie. When I went to school to get the kids, parents and kids were staring at me!

Let me try describe it to you, so if you've got the same feelings you'll feel reassured:

It's a strange types of dizziness.... most of the time it doesn't affect your balance, you can still walk etc, and positioning your head in different ways doesn't really help.

Sometimes it feels like a 'gritty' nasty dizziness in the head, and you can get strange feelings there too.

It's hard to describe to people because it's not a spinning fall over dizziness but it's also not really a light headed 'fainting' dizziness.

All your motivation goes, and if it wasn't for your 3 year old you'd sit on the sofa and watch the time go buy, feeling horrible.

Even at night when you try to sleep you feel strange and in the mornings you dread waking, and the first thing you think is 'how do I feel, am I dizzy again?'.

Go to the doctor please......
Just after I got to this stage I went down hill quite quickly because I became exhausted, and I found it hard with my kids, I dreaded them coming home from school because I couldn't function properly and give them the attention they deserve.

Looking back, after the doctor gave me medication and a treatment plan (I hate pills and was really fit, took a lot of nerve to even take the first pill) I felt much better and after a short time things improved rapidly.

When I said to the Doctor I didn't like medication etc. The Doctor said something that has stuck with me...
"You can't just make yourself better, sometime all you need is a little bit of help to get you back to where you were before"

Let us all know how you get on when you get back from the Doctor.

good luck

Oh one more thing... I too was given anti dizziness medication, which didn't really work..
The reason being that those drugs work on the vestubular system to correct balance problems that cause dizziness, if you have anxiety and stress, they won't make any difference. They might sedate you a little, so you might feel better short term.
x


miles

[Zee]

I understand all thats been said here about dizziness,lightheadedness. Its the one thing about my anxiety that I find hardest to cope with. Its all but destroyed my confidence and ability to do the things I want to do. Something I loved to do was walk my dog each morning and I still do but my anxiety level is so high that im concentrating on the thought of will I get dizzy!!
It can take over your everyday life and its awful.
My GP thinks its coming from anxiety but I have noticed that the tension in my neck and shoulders is sometimes so bad that it seems to cause the lighthead episodes. Just massaging my shoulders sometimes causes the sensation.

[ITGuy101]

Hi. I get this a lot.

The best cure for me... Make yourself really dizzy, i mean like how dizzy felt when you were a kid. spin round and you will see that its a completely different feeling.

Our problem is in our head,

Four the tension, where a hat. It helps!

[syg]

I am going through the exact same thing, I really am :(

Don't worry, I have gone from an avid gym going guy, looking pretty hot to a now skinny, pale and exhausted, worrying mess, luckily I have caring people around me, like my beautiful partner, so for that I am forever grateful.

I have suffered with severe anxiety, severe depression and severe panic disorder in bouts throughout my life, I'll have good years, then a terrible year, and so on.

This time round it's been going on again for about 5 months, each day unbearable, numerous A & E visits, because I truly believed something was wrong. To cut a long story short, I have had a CT scan, every single blood test you can imagine, an ECG on my heart & various other things.

There is nothing serious going on, or anything at all for that matter, but I couldn't accept it at first, I just felt so ill, as though I was dying from a terminal illness, not anxiety I'd laugh to myself. Then, I started to remember, wait a minute I have felt like this before, and I got completely better the last time, and have done on various occasions, even if it did go on for two whole years once, I still recovered and came back strong.

I've only just started to feel better again the past few days, it was only on Sunday I was in the A & E again scared as hell thinking something was terribly wrong, because the pressure in my head felt so intense and I could barely stand up with the dizziness. Lo & Behold after countless tests at the hospital again, there was nothing seriously wrong!

I just couldn't accept it, there had to be something underlying, and there is, ANXIETY! Silly me though as usual goes into denial about it being anxiety, etc, so in turn make everything worse, because you're searching for an illness you will probably never find.

As mentioned above, Somatic Hyper Vigilance, that's what I have, nothing else, I can't help but notice every single little sensation, tingles, pain, you name it I feel it, and why? Because Depression, linked with powerful Anxiety puts you into a ridiculously & highly sensitive state, that allows you to notice everything, and as I am sure you may know, this is your body preparing to escape or fight, only what's happened to us and the others on here is that we have become permanently stuck in Panic mode, it might not feel as severe as a Panic Attack all the time, but think back to how you felt when you had a Panic Attack, and its the same feeling as the dizziness and the head problems we suffer now.

I can promise you as the others have said above, you will get better, and the biggest healer of all, is exercise, and I really mean that, it did me absolute wonders the last time, you release natural, positive chemicals, it just happens, you can't go against it or argue with it :)

Go to the gym, yes you might feel very very dizzy the first time you work out because you'll be so concerned about feeling dizzy when you get out of breath, but eventually you'll start to feel good and you'll realise that dizziness and the odd feeling here and there is normal, only most people don't notice it like we do, but in time you'll be like that again and you'll get back on top I promise you will, if you try, think positive, look at all of us on here who suffer with the exact same thing, I'll always reply to you if and when I can, so don't worry, people are here for you, and that too will get you back on track.

The only reason everything fell back apart for me five months ago is I actually did get ill, I got Swine Flu and it made me very ill, but I recovered. Although it made me stop going to the gym as I was too ill for a few weeks, and the more the weeks went by, the more the gym became a distant memory, and the once distant memories of Panic & Anxiety soon made a fast return & became the dominant force in my life again, up until these past few days that is, where enough is enough, I have started back at the gym, and I know within 6-8 weeks I'll look just like I did, but more importantly feel like I did!

Even when you're fully better and you're looking healthy, don't worry if you still have Panic Attacks, because it's something that we will all, always be prone too, but overall your Anxiety will be something in the background that you never really notice ever, unless of course stressful circumstances occur again, which is normal. Panic Attacks will happen hardly ever in time, the dizziness really does disappear just as fast as it comes on.

Look at it like this, the last time, I had that exact same feeling that you have, for two whole years, all day everyday, it never went, ever! I had severe Migraines, Severe Panic attacks, all on top of the already permanent tension Headache and Dizziness, and yet all that suffering and why, because I let Anxiety take control again, and with just a few weeks acceptance and a little self motivation (to help yourself I mean) you can become a kinda normal person, in the sense that you can be pretty much Anxiety, Headache and Dizziness free.

Keep your head up, people like me & others on here truly do care, and I really feel for you because I know how frightened I have been, and also how frightened I can get, unbearable doesn't even begin to explain how you feel, but believe me, experiencing bad things like this might be terrible, but it will definitely make you appreciate the good times due to come, and the times of feeling healthy, etc. Trust me, don't expect miracles overnight, just go with the flow, and that flow will carry you into a place you thought would never be possible again.

I'm always here to help and talk about my experiences and to try and help you understand things more.

Good Luck Hun :)

[syg]

I understand all thats been said here about dizziness,lightheadedness. Its the one thing about my anxiety that I find hardest to cope with. Its all but destroyed my confidence and ability to do the things I want to do. Something I loved to do was walk my dog each morning and I still do but my anxiety level is so high that im concentrating on the thought of will I get dizzy!!
It can take over your everyday life and its awful.
My GP thinks its coming from anxiety but I have noticed that the tension in my neck and shoulders is sometimes so bad that it seems to cause the lighthead episodes. Just massaging my shoulders sometimes causes the sensation.

It will be Anxiety, the Tension is a result of the Anxiety, they are problematic to one another, you get a bit anxious, your head and neck becomes stiff, painful and starts to feel strange, almost as though you have permanent pins and needles, and just overall strange sensations most or even all of the time.

This leads you to worry even more, and it won't ease up, unless you do, so in my case, in my last post above, it lasted for two years with me once, because I let it take control of me.

The next time it feels unbearably tense, or pressurised, or you feel dizzy, I know it sounds silly, but try to stay calm, if you're at home jump in the shower or the bath, and believe me, as soon as you forget about the weird sensation by distracting yourself, you'll realise that you're not really that dizzy anymore, nor does the pressure seem to be as bad.

Sometimes with all of us who suffer from this, we become that used to feeling Anxious, experiencing sensations and pains more or less permanently, that when we feel completely relaxed and tension free every now and again, it can actually completely freak you out, because you feel as though it feels too good to be true or that the feeling of relaxation itself is a worrying sensation!

It takes time to get back on top, to start understanding your sensations again, but you will, as will I. So many of us are so similar, that alone should make you feel a little better :)

Stay positive, you'll get back on top in time too

[miles]

Brilliant post SYG!

I too was very fit, ran for miles, martial arts etc...

When I had my recent bout of about 7 months, really bad. It was only then that I realised that I'd had lesser bouts over the years of my life. About every 15 years or so, but never as bad as my recent one.

That made me feel better knowing that it was a repetitive anxiety thing and that I would recover. I now know what to look for and in future I'll take life a little bit easier and not be so driven.

@pinkpiglet:
You see! it's not just me saying to you that you can feel absolutely dreadful with this, and it's all probably anxiety! good luck x