Do I have one?

[samantha]

Hi everyone
Have read lots on here as a guest, with interest. I have my first MRI in two weeks time, as advised by my doctor. However, I don't 'feel' I have a tumour, but they want to make sure. To be honest I feel a bit of a fraud going off for this MRI when there are so many stories on here of people not being offered them, with much worse symptoms. 
My symptoms - left sided tinnitus for over 4 months, balance issues (but only for a few days, a few months ago then it went away), I have a 'funny' heavy, feeling on the left side of my head around my TM joint.  (doc says this may be due to clenching because of the tinnitus being annoying). And I have lost a bit of hearing ability in my left ear.
I don't have a noisy atmosphere, I don't go clubbing etc and never use walkmans or anything, so it was really the unexplained tinnitus that led me to go to the doc. I've also been very tired lately (who isn't though?!!) and don't have much interest in doing stuff, going out etc.
I'm sure nothing will show up on the MRI.
Did anyone else just have these minor symptoms?
Sam (ps I'm 32).


 

[Patti UT]

Samantha,

  My symptoms were much more defined, but from what you have going on, It sounds like you have a great doctor who will check out everything even if just to rule it out. be happy he oprdered an MRI. Better to know early on if there is anything than to wait and not know while something is growing in your head. Many or us on here, myself included, went undiagnosed and then mis diagose. Mine grew 40% over a 4 year period after I was told it was something else, and that was with an MRI. I pray that it will come out clear.

Best wishes
Patti UT

[ppearl214]

Hi Samantha and welcome.

The only true way to know is by having an MRI with contrast.   Only then, will you have your true answer to see if you do have an AN or anything else... or nothing.  My hope is that it is the latter and some of the symptoms you have will ease in time.

Hang in there and please keep us updated on the MRI... and insist on the contrast.

Phyl

[Battyp]

Sam go for that MRI!  I started out like that and was told it was viral and after 6 mos and my symtpoms getting worse they finally did the mri.  I lost the hearing before the mri which could have been avoided had I of gotten and mri sooner.  You're symtpoms are real...you're not a fraud!  Check in with us after you get your results.

Big Hugs,
M

[Sue]

Yes, Sam...better an MRI sooner rather than later.  Don't feel guilty.  This is just the best diagnostic tool doctors have to see what is going on inside your skull!  Some people have a gut instinct that something is wrong and it practically takes Congressional approval to get an MRI done....you are just the opposite. You don't feel like you have anything wrong, but your doctor is trying to rule things out.  Good for him!!  There are so many stories on here of how long it took to get properly diagnosed and treatment started. So thank your lucky stars you have a doctor who recommended an MRI.  I never even thought I'd ever have an MRI in my lifetime and in the last 9 months I've had 3.  And, FYI, they are very noisy, so don't be alarmed by all the racket they make. They will give you earplugs, but it's still noisy. That darn thing knocks, and clangs, and buzzes and thumps and I never knew that about MRIs.  I am not bothered by the "closed" MRI, but if it is not something that you are comfortable with, they can give you a pill to take the edge off.  If you have an "open" MRI, then that probably won't be in issue.  Good luck and let us know what's going on.  We're here for you, if you find out that you are joining our club. 

Sue in Vancouver USA

[samantha]

Thanks everyone. 
I'll let you know the outcome of the MRI.

Samantha.

[Obita]

Sam:

I had three "warning signs" over a year before I was diagnosed with the AN that I ignored.  Two in the car while I was driving, kind of a "what the hell was that whirling sensation" that lasted for a few seconds.  The third was when I tried to dance like a go-go-girl of the late 60's.  I just thought I was too old to do that stuff and forgot about it.

Had I been smart like you and gone to the Dr., I would be three and a half years post op instead of two and a half.

In a few weeks I hope you can come back on and say:  false alarm everyone!!  But if it is an AN, you will have a whole lot of very good friends here.

Good luck,  Kathy

[tcrnko]

My left ear problems were first treated as sinus infection with antibiotics then viral with steroids.  It took me over a month after the steroid treatment did nothing to get my MRI.
Accept the test and hope for a negative result.  Contrast will enhance anything that is strange.  Sounds like you have a good doc that thinks past many of his peers.
Please don't feel like a "fraud".  Your health is as important to you as ours is to us.  Do what you need to do to keep it at its best.

[Palace]

Dear Samantha,


Look what happened to me!  I went to the medical clinic with various severe symptoms for over ten years.  I FINALLY got a prescription to go have an MRI.  I had HMO before, and no prescription for an MRI everytime at the med-clinic with various AN symptoms.  I never heard of an AN or I would have paid for an MRI myself and got one with contrast!  My ENT finally ordered one and now my AN is so large that it is borderline whether I can have CK or the traditional surgeon surgery.  I still can have my CK date in two weeks at Stanford.  The Ct. scan (with iodine injection, I believe) is the Monday after Thanksgiving and I will ge home Tuesday, then Wed., Thurs., and Friday are the radiation dates.  I wish mine was caught sooner.

For you.......MRI WITH CONTRAST!



GOOD LUCK,



Palace

[matti]

Hi Sam - I applaud your doctor for listening to your symptoms and acting on them quickly. He/She is a keeper!!! So many of us spent years looking for help before we were properly diagnosed.

PLEASE don't feel guilty...but do feel very blessed to have such a great doctor.

Take care an keep us posted.

hugs,
Cheryl

[Pembo]

I hope you don't have an An but something much simpler to fix! That said I had vertigo for 6 weeks 3 years prior to my an diagnosis. It came and it went. In reading my old journals, I discovered I had a bout with vertigo 10 years prior, could it have been my AN starting? We'll never know.

As for being tired, I was exhausted for years. I thought it was the stress of having small children but after the AN removal, I am still one who needs more sleep but not as much as I used to.

Good luck on that MRI and please let us know what they find.

[Captain Deb]

I went to my GP with a stuffy ear and headaches. He asked one question--do you have any hearing loss in that ear? 24 hours later I was having an MRI.  Lucky lucky me to find such a great GP!!!
Capt Deb

[Jim Scott]

Hi Samantha:

Allow me to join the chorus and reassure you that having an MRI scan to determine whether or not you have an Acoustic Neuroma (or other brain-related 'issue') is simply your physician practicing good, conservative medicine.  I had many symptoms but my doctor thought I had a sinus problem so on that basis, he ordered an MRI.  Surprise!  A day later he called me, personally, from his home, to tell me the MRI results (4.5 AN) and suggested surgery, ASAP.  My signature tells the rest of the story.  I'm now 5 months post-op and doing very well, but had I not undergone that MRI (and the surgery that followed less than a month later) when I did, I might not have had such a positive result to my AN 'adventure'.   Please don't feel that you are 'wasting medical resources'.  The hospital will be paid for the MRI (they are a cash-cow for some hospitals) and you have an obligation to do what is necessary to protect your health.  I wish you well - and no AN - Samantha.     


Jim

[PRussel]

Hi, Samantha.

I, like you, didn't think I had a "brain tumor" either.  I had had persistent nausea for years.  My doctor ordered IVP and ultrasound on my abdomen and found gallstones.  After the gall bladder surgery, my nausea did not go away!  That doctor retired so I had to find a new one.  At my second visit to the new dr I complained with tinnitus in my right ear suspecting that it was a sinus infection (I had also had chronic sinus infections for years).  He asked me if I had nausea as well and when I replied that I had had nausea for years, he immediately suggested I have an MRI and told me about Acoustic Neuroma--I had never heard of it before.  I wanted to try antibiotics, so my new doctor humored me and let me try antibiotics for a couple of weeks, but when I wasn't back to "normal" by then, he insisted I have the MRI.  By the time I had the MRI, my hearing had pretty much returned to normal, but he still insisted I go ahead and have it.  Lo and behold, there was an 1cm AN, already protruding into the EAC.   

I also hope you do not have to go on this AN journey with us, but I do applaud your doctor as I do mine!  There are so many on this list who have not been so fortunate.

Yours,
Patty

[samantha]

Thanks again guys. 

Sam.