ChasingGPOs
New
Hi All,
First time poster, hoping to get some opinions and/or advice from the group. Thanks in advance to any replies!
As a background:
I went diving at the end of June with my wife. We did a single tank dive in the morning. I bought a new drysuit and was a little overweighted as a result so I sank faster than anticipated. I use Valsava - I usually clear at the surface, descend slowly, and clear regularly. This time I cleared at the surface like usual but sank like a stone so my second equalization was a bit harder than usual and I heard some squealing so I knew I was a bit behind on my clearing. That being said I cleared successfully without having to blow overly hard. The next few equalizations felt more difficult than normal but this went away after a minute or so while we oriented ourselves at the bottom (~8-10 metres), and the rest of the dive was uneventful. We were more or less at steady depths so I didn't clear as often throughout the dive as I usually do.
After the dive my ears felt fine and I used some ear beer as I normally do to prevent any infection/stuffiness. My ear felt fine until the next evening at which point my ear started to feel stuffy, I had tinnitus, and my ear was painful if I burped. Since onset was delayed by about 36 hours I thought maybe it was ear wax or ear infection, but was also aware that I could have barotrauma given my squealing ear. Went in to see the GP after a couple days who said no ear wax, no evidence of infection. My symptoms actually improved almost entirely a day later and I thought I was fine to dive again, but a few days later the symptoms reappeared along with tingling in my ear and jaw. Went back to a different GP a week later who said my ear canal was irritated and I "may" have fluid in the middle ear. To summarize a fairly long process since then: I've had 2 initial courses of CiproDex antibiotic ear drops which both gave symptom resolution during treatment but each had symptom recurrence immediately after finishing. I also had 10 days of Keflex - so can presumably rule out infection at this point. I've had intermittent stuffiness of the ear since finishing the antibiotics, which usually lasts for a few days at a time. Throughout the intermittent "stuffy episodes" I've had tinnitus and a painful ear when burping or yawning aggressively, although I almost wonder if this has been more muscle spasm rather than true "burping." More recently I've also had a squelchy/goopy sensation if my ear is compressed which I makes me consider glue ear vs. swelling/fluid accumulation in the surrounding tissues. To confuse things though, I did see an ENT at the end of August who said my ear canal looked perfectly fine, my middle ear has no fluid in it, and my Eustachian tubes have no evidence of dysfunction. The ENT said I can dive but I don't really trust that given my persistent tinnitus and pain when burping/yawning. Two of the LDS' I frequent have said they think barotrauma is unlikely but I can't imagine it being something else at this point.
Normally I would just wait out the symptoms, but unfortunately my wife and I have booked a dive trip in Indonesia as part of our honeymoon at the end of October, and this is paid for already. We anticipate about 22-30 dives over 2 weeks. I am starting to get very nervous about whether I can dive safely. I think that my "stuffy episodes" may be related to particularly strong burps/muscle spasms so I'm worried that clearing my ears will cause irritation, but I also think if I have some sort of glue ear that I need to clear my ears to help get rid of that?
For the group:
- Has anyone experienced any sort of delayed symptoms like that?
- At what point can you safely start equalizing after a barotrauma event (assuming it was this)? It's been 12 weeks so I feel like any actual injury should have healed by now...seems crazy to have such long sequela when I didn't have typical "serious" barotrauma symptoms mid-dive.
- Any other thoughts or recommendations? It's a bit of an abnormal presentation with the relapse/remitting symptoms so I'm at a loss of what this really is.
Apologies for the long post, didn't mean for it be a novel! Thanks again for anyone's contributions and thoughts. As an aside, I also think I'll try to learn Frenzel technique as I read that this is more gentle/effective than Valsava, but I don't think I can practice until I can safely clear my ears!
First time poster, hoping to get some opinions and/or advice from the group. Thanks in advance to any replies!
As a background:
I went diving at the end of June with my wife. We did a single tank dive in the morning. I bought a new drysuit and was a little overweighted as a result so I sank faster than anticipated. I use Valsava - I usually clear at the surface, descend slowly, and clear regularly. This time I cleared at the surface like usual but sank like a stone so my second equalization was a bit harder than usual and I heard some squealing so I knew I was a bit behind on my clearing. That being said I cleared successfully without having to blow overly hard. The next few equalizations felt more difficult than normal but this went away after a minute or so while we oriented ourselves at the bottom (~8-10 metres), and the rest of the dive was uneventful. We were more or less at steady depths so I didn't clear as often throughout the dive as I usually do.
After the dive my ears felt fine and I used some ear beer as I normally do to prevent any infection/stuffiness. My ear felt fine until the next evening at which point my ear started to feel stuffy, I had tinnitus, and my ear was painful if I burped. Since onset was delayed by about 36 hours I thought maybe it was ear wax or ear infection, but was also aware that I could have barotrauma given my squealing ear. Went in to see the GP after a couple days who said no ear wax, no evidence of infection. My symptoms actually improved almost entirely a day later and I thought I was fine to dive again, but a few days later the symptoms reappeared along with tingling in my ear and jaw. Went back to a different GP a week later who said my ear canal was irritated and I "may" have fluid in the middle ear. To summarize a fairly long process since then: I've had 2 initial courses of CiproDex antibiotic ear drops which both gave symptom resolution during treatment but each had symptom recurrence immediately after finishing. I also had 10 days of Keflex - so can presumably rule out infection at this point. I've had intermittent stuffiness of the ear since finishing the antibiotics, which usually lasts for a few days at a time. Throughout the intermittent "stuffy episodes" I've had tinnitus and a painful ear when burping or yawning aggressively, although I almost wonder if this has been more muscle spasm rather than true "burping." More recently I've also had a squelchy/goopy sensation if my ear is compressed which I makes me consider glue ear vs. swelling/fluid accumulation in the surrounding tissues. To confuse things though, I did see an ENT at the end of August who said my ear canal looked perfectly fine, my middle ear has no fluid in it, and my Eustachian tubes have no evidence of dysfunction. The ENT said I can dive but I don't really trust that given my persistent tinnitus and pain when burping/yawning. Two of the LDS' I frequent have said they think barotrauma is unlikely but I can't imagine it being something else at this point.
Normally I would just wait out the symptoms, but unfortunately my wife and I have booked a dive trip in Indonesia as part of our honeymoon at the end of October, and this is paid for already. We anticipate about 22-30 dives over 2 weeks. I am starting to get very nervous about whether I can dive safely. I think that my "stuffy episodes" may be related to particularly strong burps/muscle spasms so I'm worried that clearing my ears will cause irritation, but I also think if I have some sort of glue ear that I need to clear my ears to help get rid of that?
For the group:
- Has anyone experienced any sort of delayed symptoms like that?
- At what point can you safely start equalizing after a barotrauma event (assuming it was this)? It's been 12 weeks so I feel like any actual injury should have healed by now...seems crazy to have such long sequela when I didn't have typical "serious" barotrauma symptoms mid-dive.
- Any other thoughts or recommendations? It's a bit of an abnormal presentation with the relapse/remitting symptoms so I'm at a loss of what this really is.
Apologies for the long post, didn't mean for it be a novel! Thanks again for anyone's contributions and thoughts. As an aside, I also think I'll try to learn Frenzel technique as I read that this is more gentle/effective than Valsava, but I don't think I can practice until I can safely clear my ears!
