Rocks In His Head!

At last, we have definitive proof. A Doctor even says so: Steve has rocks in his head!

As you will all recall, Steve has been trying to get his dizziness diagnosed and cured for close to a year now. Doctor after doctor has put their two cents - plus $30.00 co-pay - in, with no improvement. His ear infection was cured and massive amounts of ear wax removed. The Epley maneuver was performed. That was just the first doctor visit. This, that, and the other was investigated and/or performed. It wasn't a tumor. It wasn't Menhirs disease. It wasn't... well, the list grew.

Small consolation, as there was still no change. Appointments were set up with new doctors for after we returned from summer vacation and his insurance kicked in again, since it covers only emergencies during vacation traveling.

Meanwhile, the dizzy spells were relentless. He might go a few days without a major one, then have several in a row. His continuing experience with them allowed him to get better at dealing with them, or just letting him know that bed was the only answer. But whenever one struck even there, he was clinging on for dear life just to prevent falling out of a perfectly flat, still surface. Occasionally I was still needed to hold onto him and guide him down the hall. Due to their lack of any forewarning, driving was forbidden, of course. He got a pill so he wouldn't throw up when the world went crazy, but lack of driving was the worst part to him.

His relatives knew of somebody or another who had the same problem after a minor spinal injury. We could track the start of this problem to shortly after Steve's breaking his tailbone last fall. Since the folks "everybody knew" this had happened to had none of them recovered from their dizziness for the remainder of their lives, this was a bit of a worry. We resolved to add a spinal specialist to the list of possibilities, without much optimism.

Today was another one of those appointments, this time with an ENT specialist. He agreed with Steve's assessment that this might be related to the fall which broke Steve's tailbone. He had a slightly better explanation, however: rocks in his head! The fall had knocked them loose and they had never gone back where they belonged.

Sounded to me exactly like the explanation for vertigo, only my doc referred to mine as "floaters". OK, so vertigo on steroids, then. The good news was that he ran Steve through a series of moves which, as Steve described them, sounded like Epley's on steroids. When Steve finally sat up afterwards, no dizziness.

Best news of all: in two days, so long as he's careful in moving his head slowly and the dizziness doesn't come back, Steve can drive again!!!

And I get to tell  him he has rocks in his head!