Getting desperate - can anyone help?

[OceanChild]

Hi all!  This is my first time posting here, and please excuse my extraordinarily long post today.  I'm hoping someone can suggest something that might be the cause of my symptoms, or offer some help in relieving the symptoms.

In December 2006, I started to feel short of breath - like I could breath out all the way.  I started to get dizzy off and on - which was more like an unbalance, or things were subtly moving around me (not vertigo).  I was diagnosed with anxiety, which, knowing what I know now (that my sinuses are clogged - how could the docs have missed that?!), was not an accurate diagnosis.  I think I developed anxiety,  but did not have anxiety to start with, because I kept being told that the physical symptoms I had were not real.  

Anyway, so the shortness of breath/dizziness continued as the same, up until late February of 2007.  In Feb., I got a throat infection, with some type of bacteria that was similar to strep but was not strep A.  My ears got clogged, my throat was really swollen, the dizziness was worse that before, and I had a fever.  The docs tried to treat it with antibiotics, but I had allergic reactions to 3 different types; they finally said to forget it, it'd go away on it's own.

From March '07 until June '07, every month like clockwork I would get sick with the same illness I had in February, just not as severe (lower fever, didn't last as long, etc).  I still was dizzy off and on regardless if I was sick or not, my ears were still clogged off and on.  I went back to the doctor every time I got sick between March and June, and they tried a variety of different things - Nasonex (which gave me weird side effects and didn't help anyway), allergy medicine (Allegra D and Claritin, neither worked, and the Allegra made me bounce off the walls); and Flonase (gave me nosebleeds).  I also got a bout of true vertigo that lasted about 2 weeks and went away on it's own, with some ringing in my ears thrown in just for fun.  I saw an ENT who said I had "labrinthia" or something, but that doesn't explain my swollen glands or the fact that it hasn't gotten better in 7 months.  The ENT was at least 100 years old and spent less than 3 minutes with me, I'm not exaggerating; so I'm not taking what he said too seriously.

I just had a physical last week (July '07), and my doc told me that I have fluid behind my ears, which could be the cause of the dizziness/unbalance, that I have post-nasal drip (? didn't even realize).  I do have pressure between my eyes, so I started irrigating my sinuses at least once/day with a saline/salt rinse, and it's taken away at least 50% of the dizziness and the shortness of breath - but I'm still experiencing all my symptoms, just not as severe.  I've also been gargling with salt water, in an attempt to sooth the throat issues.

I have some pollen allergies, but they only usually last between April-June, so that doesn't explain the symptoms from December-March, and this month.  I also have some food allergies.  Aside from that, allergy testing has shown nothing.  I have a sinus CT scheduled for next week, but I'm not holding my breath about that, either.

Any suggestions on what could be causing this, or what I could do to relieve the symptoms?  The dizziness is the most bothersome - I've been off and on unbalanced for over 7 months now.

[Turbonium]

Hi. You might want to try eriodictyol glycoside. It's a component of lemon bio-flavonoids. I had poorly diagnosed vertigo, tinnitus, meniere's disease, etc. a couple of years back. It was getting very bad. I had dizziness that was driving me crazy. It was very worrisome.

I went to all the usual doctors, and all I came away with was prescriptions for antihistamines. However, one ENT doctor prescribed an over-the-counter product, Lipoflavonoid. It's a supplement.

I was very skeptical, and I said so. She told me that some research had been done that showed it worked. So, okay, I'll try it.

To my great surprise and relief, it DID work. Apparently it works like an antihistamine and improves blood circulation in the inner ear.  Lipoflavonoid is a brand-name and is pretty expensive, so I found thru other online forums that you can get plain old Lemon Bioflavonoids for much less. I take two caplets of Lemon BIoflavonoids a day and my inner ear symptoms are nearly gone. Apparently--and you don't hear this everywhere--the eriodictyol glycoside is really only in Lemon bioflavonoids, not all citrus. If you buy just 'citrus' bioflavonoids you probably won't get relief. I use Lindberg brand Lemon Bioflavonoid Complex, and no, I don't work for them and this is not spam.

Look up eriodictyol glycoside on the internet. You'll see it's for real. It's the only thing that helped me. It helped with vertigo/dizziness and ear pain, specifically.