r/cervical_vertigo

the past two to three weeks I’ve had a constant off balance/swaying sensation, also at random times when mostly standing I have a sudden lightheaded dizzy spell and have to quickly grab onto something or sit down.

I also have neck pain, lower back pain, and pain down my left leg.
it also feels bruised under my left kneecap but there’s no visible bruising, it just hurts to press it.

Sometimes the random lightheaded dizzy spell is triggered by looking or leaning left. but not everytime.
sometimes it comes on randomly.

I have an e-consult with the GP next week to see what’s going on.

I just can’t work out whether this is coming from my eyes, inner ear, neck/posture, nerves, blood pressure, or something else.

has anyone experienced this?

Firstly, this subreddit really saved me during the worst of my symptoms. I’m grateful for all of the active people in here always willing to share their story or help someone else in the comments.

Now to get into the part that might give you some hope.

For more context on my situation, I posted a detailed post about my symptoms here about half a year ago. It’s on my profile if you’d like to read more in-depth about them.
TLDR; My severe symptoms started about a year ago after a deep tissue neck/shoulder massage, but I’ve had very moderate symptoms for 4-6 years.

I know this is about 50/50 in this sub, but a craniocervical chiropractor absolutely changed my life. They don’t do cracking or popping like normal chiros, and mine specifically specializes in vertigo, dizziness and migraines.

I hit a point about 4 months ago where I felt absolutely hopeless. I had seen about every doctor in the book and every test came back clean (besides slight anemia that I’ve had my whole life, that I’m actively treating.)

I sit at a desk all day, whether it’s working or gaming or relaxing watching shows with my friends in discord, and my posture was destroyed, but I used to be an athlete in about every sport — swimming, bodybuilding, running, soccer, basketball, volleyball, etc. When symptoms started, I could barely go up and down the elevators in my high-rise, let alone walk some days.

My first appointment with this special chiropractor was almost 3 hours long. He ran so many visual and postural tests on me that I’ve never seen or heard of before, including taking an in-house CT scan of my neck. He has a thermal imaging tool to see where the bones are misaligned, which he uses before and after adjustments to make sure your neck straight.

We finished the appointment with an atlas bone adjustment (no cracking), a diagnosis of ligament damage in my upper neck causing the bones to slip, and he requested I come back once a week.

The first adjustment made things worse, which he warned me of prior. I was so off balance that my husband had to help me stand in the shower so I didn’t topple over. My symptoms subsided after a day or two after the adjustment. BUT, I went back the next week and saw him again, and again, and again. And after each appointment, I felt more and more relief.

I’m 4 months deep, and I only see him once a month now.

My first month (seeing him once a week) was a little rough. I had good days and bad days. He also helped me do some back-strengthening exercises, optical exercises and posture checks during the day at home. I saw improvement each week though, and that continued into about month 3.

I started going in for appointments and my neck bones were aligned, staying in place where they should be. I had virtually 0 symptoms, aside from an occasional visual one but no “swaying, rocking, falling, dropping” sensations. All of my previous triggers were gone — I started living a normal life again.

I did have a bad flare up about a week ago, which was directly related to going back to heavy weight lifting too quickly and my shoulder/neck getting extremely tight again and the tension caused some pretty debilitating vertigo for about 2 hours, but that quickly went away with a heating pad and ibuprofen for the swelling.

Overall, I would never recommend a regular chiropractor, as they don’t know enough about this stuff to be safe. But someone who specializes in vertigo, dizziness and migraines and the upper neck — I would recommend 10 times out of 10.

I live with about 95% recovery now. I don’t know if I’ll ever get to 100%, considering I have pretty bad ligament damage in my neck from years of headbanging, pole dancing and sitting with horrible posture, but I can live with 95%.

It’s hope, and that’s what a lot of us in the subreddit need. ♡

Does anyone else only get dizziness when sitting or laying down? I can’t even sit and turn my head to have a conversation without getting intense rocking side to side and my ears start ringing and I’m in a total fog. Buying a standing desk for work has helped and limiting phone time, but only slightly. My last mri before my symptoms got worse, showed C5–C6 and C6–C7 degenerative disc disease but I feel like everyone has that. Hard to not think everything is in my head. Open to recommendations or solidarity. This condition is brutal.

I started suffering from unexplained “dizziness” about 3 years ago. It kind of felt like a permanent cannabis high - light headedness, eyes trouble tracking when turning my head, slight head fog.

I went to doctor, physical therapy, and acupuncture (traditional Chinese medicine).

Doctor said heat therapy and stretching. Maybe some immediate slight relief, but nothing substantial or lasting.

Physical therapist had me do stretching and some neck and back strength exercises. Relief was slightly more and slightly longer.

Went to acupuncturist, starting once a week, where they started with gua sha and cupping, followed by acupuncture. Noticed even more relief and for longer periods of time (a couple of weeks) - and enough time to figure out what seems to be causing it.

I have a desk job where I look at a computer screen all day. I switched from sitting most of the day to standing most of the day, and have had almost no dizziness since I started doing that.

I think it ultimately comes down to neck/upper back strength and posture. When I do get dizziness now, I can almost tie it directly to extended periods of bad posture.

Hi first thanks for taking the time to read and answer

So my mri should disc bludge in c3-4 c4-5 and also reversed curve and i have very hard muscle spasm all over my traps and upper neck but i rarely get vertigo but always i have rocking, swaying, difficulty standing still,zapping and also the dropping sensation but my neurolgist think that the neck is not a contributor to my symptoms he is telling me go on ssri and that neck well also be fixed when the dizziness is gone however the neck dr told me that the neck is causing all of this so can you tell me if anyone had something similar and physiotherapy helped him

Hi everyone,

I really hope someone here might read my post and recognize themselves in it. I’m simply looking for people who have experienced something similar and maybe eventually found out what was behind it. I’m getting pretty desperate because I’ve been dealing with these symptoms for months, and they sometimes completely take over my everyday life, while the examinations keep coming back mostly normal, or when something is found, I’m told that it doesn’t explain all of my symptoms.

I’m a 20-year-old woman and this all started in April 2026. Back then, I had what felt like a circulatory collapse. I had been out partying the evening before, and alcohol and cigarettes were involved. I fell to the floor, everything went black and purple, and I couldn’t move for a few seconds. When I tried to get back up, it happened again immediately. I didn’t injure myself. The paramedics suspected orthostatic hypotension.
Yesterday, for the first time since April, I had that exact feeling again, just as strongly. I genuinely thought I was about to collapse.

Since then, I have had a practically constant, very strange swaying dizziness. It’s not classic spinning vertigo, but more like feeling as if you’re on a boat or as if the ground is giving way underneath you. It reminds me of the feeling you get when you step out of an elevator and it seems to drop slightly one more time. It’s worse when standing and walking, and sometimes I feel it with EVERY single step.

Depending on the day, I also have brain fog, concentration problems, fatigue, pressure and heaviness in my head, sometimes blurred vision, tinnitus in both ears, additional pressure in my right ear, tingling in my arms, legs and face since June, neck and upper back pain (sometimes sharp/stabbing), recurring severe tailbone pain, and jaw problems due to TMJ dysfunction. The tingling has become much less frequent by now.

During worse phases, I don’t feel like myself at all. It feels as if I’m dreaming or not really there, together with the dizziness. Even while lying down, I sometimes feel as if the room is slightly tilting or moving back and forth. At night, I sometimes get a feeling similar to briefly falling, except that my body and head suddenly feel very light and foreign. I really don’t know how to describe it any better. For a while, the dizziness was always worse indoors, so as soon as I entered a building it suddenly became much stronger, while it was much better outside. Then that completely disappeared for a while and the dizziness became independent of where I was. Now it varies from day to day.

One thing that still really confuses me is this: I had already been dizzy for about a month when I used a nasal spray. Afterwards, I also used a corticosteroid nasal spray for a longer period, and suddenly my symptoms were practically completely gone for about four weeks. This happened after the very first spray of the regular nasal spray. Then the symptoms came back quite suddenly and even worse than before. After starting the spray, I also sometimes had a feeling of something running inside my right ear, which initially made me think there might be a ventilation problem. I am actually having that strong running sensation in my right ear again now.

I have been to several ENT doctors by now, including inner ear and balance testing. For the most part, everything was normal. At one point, a possible ventilation problem was suspected, but nothing that should explain all of these symptoms. Neurologically, nothing abnormal has been found either.
My brain MRI showed an approximately 4 × 3 mm cystic-appearing lesion in the tectum area, without contrast enhancement and without any obstruction of the cerebrospinal fluid flow. A follow-up MRI was recommended. According to the doctors, this does not explain my symptoms.

My cervical spine MRI showed a flattened cervical curve and a small cystic structure at C6/7, possibly contacting the C7 nerve root, but no clear severe compression. The neurologist also said that this would not explain my symptoms.

I was also diagnosed with TMJ dysfunction. I have pressure and tension in my jaw and a very noticeable rubbing/grinding sound on the left when I push my lower jaw backwards. I have had three TMJ treatment sessions so far, but I actually feel like it has gotten worse because of them. At the beginning of September, all four wisdom teeth were also removed because I thought they might be contributing to my TMJ problems and possibly therefore to the dizziness. It didn’t improve anything. I also wear a night splint.

Something else I find very noticeable is that playing piano makes my dizziness worse. If I sing while playing, it can become significantly worse.
I have also had some very low blood pressure readings at home. My previous bloodwork was normal. Today I had blood drawn again, including a full blood count and thyroid levels. I’ll add the results once I have them.
I don’t know if this is relevant, but I had my ears pinned back in two surgeries when I was 12 and 14. The first one didn’t turn out very well cosmetically, so I had to have another surgery. Maybe that somehow has something to do with it, I really don’t know.

At this point, I just feel like I’m going from one examination to the next and still have no idea what is actually wrong with me.

So my question to you is:

Does anyone recognize this exact feeling? This constant swaying like being on a boat, the strange dreamlike feeling, feeling like you’re not really there, sensations of movement even while lying down, combined with neck, jaw, ear and circulation/blood pressure problems?
Has anyone also started with near-fainting or orthostatic hypotension and then had symptoms like these for months afterwards?
Or has anyone experienced this temporary, complete improvement after using a nasal spray?

I’m really not looking for a remote diagnosis. I would simply like to hear from people who have been through something similar and eventually found a connection between their symptoms, or who found a particular examination or medical specialty that ultimately helped them.

Hi everyone,

I’m a 26-year-old looking for insight from anyone who has experienced a similar cervicogenic dizziness. For the past 4 months, I’ve been dealing with a cascade of highly positional symptoms. My Brain MRI and C-Spine MRI (without contrast), ENT balance tests, blood work, and comprehensive eye exams are all completely normal/clear.

Because my imaging shows no structural issues, I am trying to figure out if these symptoms could still point to a cervicogenic dizziness. Here is my exact timeline and how my symptoms behave:

• Month 1: It started suddenly while working at a computer desk. I felt a highly uncomfortable sensation in my upper neck, and my upper spine was in acute pain for several days.
• Month 2: 10 days later, a severe, sharp stabbing pain developed strictly behind my eyebrows (nowhere else). It was highly positional and accompanied by a hot, heating sensation in my head. Interestingly, it immediately vanished a month later after doing chin tucks, but came back 10 days later.
• Month 3: The eyebrow headache eventually stopped on its own after a week, but the head and upper body heating sensation peaked. Exactly 7 days after that peak, a constant dizziness started. Chin tucks was not helping this time.
• Visual Symptoms: 10 days into the dizziness, 3 eye floaters appeared in my left eye. An ophthalmologist confirmed my retinas are perfect. Since then, they have increased to 10–15 very faint, semi-translucent floaters (10-20% opacity) only visible under heavy overhead lighting or white backgrounds.
• Month 4: The dizziness became constant, "drunk/off" sensation rather than room-spinning vertigo. I also started experiencing sudden heart rate spikes and newly elevated/borderline blood pressure.
• Recent Symptom (Past Month): When getting up, my head often feels incredibly heavy, like something is physically pressing down on it. This heavy head sensation is significantly worse when I am tired or sleep-deprived.

Strict Orthostatic / Postural Triggers:

• The Upright Heat & Pressure: The upper body/head heating sensation and the heavy-head pressure are 100% tied to gravity. They are active while standing or walking, sometimes ease slightly when sitting down, and disappear when lying in bed.
• Sensory Overload: My dizziness severely spike when I enter visually busy, crowded places or supermarkets.
• Postural Trigger: Last week, I drove for hours on a dark, rough dirt road where I had to tense and jut my head forward. This specific posture exactly reproduced the original stabbing pain slightly above my eyebrows a few times while driving.

My Questions for the Group:

1. Does a constant "drunk" floating dizziness (rather than a typical low-pressure headache) match anyone else's dizziness experience?
2. Has anyone experienced upper body/head heating sensations or sudden heart rate spikes upon standing up as a secondary feature of a cervicogenic dizziness?
3. Did anyone have normal/clear Brain and C-Spine MRIs initially but later found a better way to get it checked?

I would love to hear your thoughts, experiences, or any advice on what questions I should ask my specialists next. Thank you so much.

Hi everyone,

For some context, I've been dealing with my symptoms for just about 2 months now. I am still waiting to see a neurologist, but I have recently started work with a PT that has experience with vestibular and concussion rehab. Her professional opinion is that while I have a ton of overlap with vestibular migraine and PPPD symptoms, it doesn't quite fit, and she believes cervicogenic dizziness is a piece of the puzzle (along with some visual processing component that I don't know anything about yet). As a result, I've started doing PT that involves massages, strengthening exercises, and dry needling.

My question to you all is about some of the other physical symptoms I've been dealing with. One thing that is really plaguing me right now is that I often wake up in the middle of the night with a sudden increase in dizziness, muscle tension all over my body including my chest, and warmth/heat (I'm either really warm when I wake up or I'm already drenched in sweat). This happens about 8 out of 10 nights at this point and is very disruptive to my rest. It feels like some kind of autonomic response, but of course my anxious brain also goes to cardiac issues. Has anyone else dealt with this as a symptom of your CD/CV? I can imagine that weakness in my neck could cause all kinds of downstream symptoms, but because I haven't had any thorough assessments besides the PT, I was hoping for maybe a little reassurance that this is normal and that I don't have some other serious problem going on 😄 Thanks for reading!!