u/pastelariss

Last friday I had a ct with contrast to hopefully figure out what is causing my pt. The hospital said the results are ready but I haven't heard from the ent yet who gave the referral.

I'm very nervous. I know most of the time the cause is something treatable which gives me hope but it also doesn't stop the anxiety of worst case scenarios. I am not going to look at the results because though I am curious I also know myself and I'll just fall down the rabbit hole of googling and googling until I'm an anxious mess.

I will wait for the ent because I know it'll be better to hear it all from him

this is just a vent post. i posted about 40 days ago also venting about my experience.

i've been starting my journey of figuring out a cause. i had lab work done and it's not something like anemia or my thyroid so now we're moving on to getting scans done and i'm scared all over again.

i'm not scared of the scan itself though i'm not excited for it. i'm scared of what may be found. i don't really have any other symptoms that are concerning or any other reason to think the cause is something bad but i still have health anxiety and worry that it is something bad.

though i am scared of the cause i know it's also going to be relieving ruling things out and hopefully discovering the cause and being able to treat it.

i am not necessarily looking for medical advice because i know most people here are not doctors but i guess i just need some reassurance to calm my health anxiety

i started dealing with PT roughly 3 years ago, started at either the end of 2022 or beginning of 2023. currently i am 26, F, and considered obese. i'm including that because i know it can be a factor in PT but i obviously don't know the cause.

in 2023 i saw an ENT and he really wasn't much help besides saying i'd need an MRI to determine the cause, which i know is true. i never went to get one because i was afraid and am still afraid. i've got a lot of anxiety related to my health and to medical procedures. the only surgery i've had is my wisdom teeth removal and that resulted in a horrible panic attack.

i, like many other people posting about PT, have a lot of anxiety regarding it but don't know what to do. it started in my left ear, coming and going in sync with my heartbeat. it gets worse when i'm dealing with a lot of anxiety/stress and it doesn't go away when pressing on my neck. i really only notice it now when i'm lying down to go to sleep or in deep silence.

a few weeks ago i began to notice a whooshing in my right ear but only when tilting my head certain ways or bending down or standing up fast and it isn't rhythmic with my pulse. i've gotten the whooshing before when bending down. one the right side it does go away when pressing on my neck. i noticed it after starting to smoke weed again after stopping for a few months while job hunting but i'm not sure if it's related or not because i can't remember exactly when it started. i live in a state where it is only legal medically and i use it for some chronic pain and for my anxiety. every now and then my hearing in the right ear will muffle with a slight ringing for a few seconds and then it will go away and occasionally will feel a kind of pressure in that ear but not necessarily pain so i don't know if they're related. this hasn't happened in awhile. a couple weeks at least since i started limiting how often i wear my airpods in the right ear. i also will hear a fluttering in my right ear when i wear an airpod in the left ear or hold a phone to the left. i think the reasoning for that is because i was wearing my airpod in my right ear a lot at work.

i want to treat this so it will go away but i am so scared. my mind automatically goes to worst case scenarios.

i do get headaches and neck pain but nothing more than i used to and they're not anymore severe. with my job i'm sitting a majority of the day and will be looking at a computer screen or down at my desk so i know that's partly the cause of the pain.

thank you for the responses and help.