Vasomotor Rhinitis, or what?

[cheermom1]

In 1999 (49 yrs. old), something turned my mucus system on hyper drive; it

[National Jewish]

This is obviously a very difficult and frustrating problem for you.  From what you have explained vasomotor rhinitis is the most likely diagnosis for your problems.  This simply means that for a variety of possible reasons, the blood vessels lining your respiratory tract are in a more irritable state and react by swelling and releasing fluid.  The drainage that you describe is how you experience this.

The most common time for this problem to occur is during thyroid problems and hormonal changes in life: puberty, pregnancy, premenopause.  Anything that changes the hormone level can aggravate your symptoms.  Almost anything that causes an increased blood flow can also make your symptoms worse.  This would include: exercise; heat and cold changes; spicy foods; and emotions, especially stress.  It is not likely this is going to go away so soon, but you have a real good chance of this happening after some further changes in your body and life.  Until that time, avoiding the exposures and situations that create a change in blood flow will help.  Continued use of drying medicines, such as the anticholinergics and the "old" antihistamines, will also help.  However the

[imbabsj]

Yikes! I'm 57 and I've been dealing with a similar situation for the last year. Mine started after a virus and I just never got better. I do have adult onset asthma  diagnosed about a year and ahalf ago however this is a completely different situation according to the docs.  I too am coughing up great quantities of phlem and my chest hurts sometimes I still get green and yellow sputum after a year of antibiotics that have failed to knock this out.  I have lupus and my Rheumetolgist recently tried a course of prednisone to see if it was a lupus related problem which it did not respond to that either .  What the heck could this be ?  If anyone has any thoughts I also would like to hear them since I am miserable with this problem.

[cheermom1]

I never cough up anything. I just have a constant trickle down my throat, or a globus sensation in my throat - like there's something stuck in there and my throat is closing up. Again, it gets worse when I eat or drink. When it first started in 1999, I would only 'juice-up' for only an hour after eating. Now, it pretty much lasts all day; sometimes I wake up with it, or it can just develop on its own. Wierd.