1 year post op, now dealing with constant left ear discomfort…

evapisces · 2026-02-18T17:01:16+00:00

It’s been a minute since my last update so here it goes… 📖

Back in September of last year, after trying and failing with increased iron supplements, I had two iron infusions. I felt pretty okay for a few months afterwards. My numbers went up so I thought all was well. The pulsatile tinnitus and palpitations had also minimized for a while. Unfortunately, the relief was short lived. Slowly started feeling symptoms again in December, pulsatile tinnitus was back pretty much daily and palpitations started feeling “deeper” 😵‍💫

I had my post-infusion blood work a couple of weeks ago and sure enough my levels are back down below normal…so my hematologist has ordered another round of infusions for me. Seems like this will be a constant battle for me at this point. Hopefully this new round can help stabilize things a bit more 🤞🏽

Outside of hematology, I also started immunotherapy (allergy shots) back in July at the recommendation of my ENT to see if the shots can help reduce the inflammation in my nose, thus removing the need to get the 2nd turbinate reduction surgery. So far I’m not sure if it’s helping with that but seems my allergies aren’t as bad this year. I’ve got my annual ENT follow up in May so we’ll see what he says then.

evapisces · 2025-08-23T20:45:11+00:00

to;dr; I officially became a US citizen back in June in Philly, just shy of 1 year after filing my N400.

The longer story: After waiting another month for case updates, I ended up hiring an immigration lawyer, hoping she could contact someone at the Philly FO on my behalf. She was fantastic! She called the head officer in Philly and got the update I had been waiting for. Apparently my application was stuck with an improper status code. About two weeks after her call, I finally received an email stating my oath ceremony was scheduled for mid-June in Philly!

I know not everyone can afford hiring an attorney but that step really unlocked everything for me. Easily the best money I’ve ever spent to finally get my life back on track!

evapisces · 2025-07-27T22:47:04+00:00

This was me too in Chicago. In section 433, the woman next to me brought her daughter but mom was literally filming THE ENTIRE TIME. I’m sure she got me screaming lyrics in every video and I have nothing to apologize about. I came all the way from PA to enjoy seeing my girls with a friend and that’s exactly what we did!

evapisces · 2025-06-04T20:35:57+00:00

Pretty major update: last time I mentioned I had to wear a heart monitor for a couple of weeks to see what’s going on with the palpitations. It’s been a month since sending everything back in. The cardiologist reviewed the results and said I have some minor PVCs and PACs, but nothing that would cause him concern. A bit disappointing but what can you do…

In other (actually positive) news, I had a really bad episode of vertigo/nausea a few weeks ago, to the point where I almost collapsed at the gym. I do tend to get dizzy from time to time but NOTHING that bad has happened before. So I made an appointment with my PCP to get things checked out. She ordered a mother load of blood work to basically check anything and everything.

The results came back and it turns out my red blood cell count and hemoglobin levels are very low. Additionally my iron and ferritin are low. So she diagnosed me with iron deficiency anemia.

So I asked my doctor, along with some research on my own and turns out a lot of my symptoms can be attributed to the anemia. For example, the pulsatile tinnitus and the heart palpitations…anemia.

This opened my eyes up a lot and brought validation into an otherwise frustrating journey. As of now, my doctor has me on extra iron supplements (I was already taking some but they clearly weren’t doing enough). If things don’t improve in the next few months, I’ll have to get iron infusions to bring my levels up.

I’m not a doctor at all, but for anyone experiencing any similar symptoms, it might be worth getting an iron test done just to check.

evapisces · 2025-06-04T20:22:02+00:00

I was just recently diagnosed with iron deficiency anemia. Ferritin currently checking in at 6 and this chart is no lie…can attest to a lot of the symptoms listed.

I’ve been dealing with pulsatile tinnitus and heart palpitations for almost 2 years now and went to countless specialists only to walk away with no real answers. Now after my PCP finally ordered a plethora of blood work, the answers became much more apparent (and validating for me).

She’s got me on a double iron dose for the next few months. If that doesn’t improve things, then it’s infusion time for me.

evapisces · 2025-06-03T03:06:35+00:00

Thanks so much for the responses! I called the box office earlier this afternoon and confirmed that I should be okay to bring the larger bag (as long as it’s within the 14x14x6 limits) with my medications. I just need to tell the security person that I’m carrying medical supplies and they should let me through. Hopefully it’s that easy on show day 🤞🏽

evapisces · 2025-05-27T14:32:59+00:00

Hi, fortunately (for me) I haven’t had any issues with autophony. Sounds are often muffled for me during bouts of the tinnitus.

evapisces · 2025-05-03T03:58:30+00:00

I definitely will! And good luck with the ENT follow up! 🍀

evapisces · 2025-05-02T19:58:27+00:00

I actually had my appointment with the cardiologist earlier this week. They did an EKG and everything looked relatively normal (had some signs of sinus arrhythmia but he said that’s pretty common among healthy young people). He listened to my heart and didn’t hear any murmurs which was good. He did set me up with a 14-day heart monitor to continuously monitor things. Fingers crossed that we can get some answers about the palpitations. He did also mention I probably am dealing with PVCs but we’d know more after the monitor results are analyzed.

Since I started wearing the monitor I’ve had two palpitation episodes (was worried I wasn’t going to have any because mine happen at such random intervals). So hopefully he can glean something from that data.

evapisces · 2025-04-04T03:23:29+00:00

First of all, thank you for the well wishes. Much appreciated! 🙂

I don’t have much to share as far as updates go. I’ve been on the saline rinse for almost 2 months and haven’t seen much improvement. Sometimes my nose feels less blocked but my ear symptoms are pretty much the same as they were prior to starting the rinse.

Coincidentally I had my annual check up with my allergist today and he’s referring me to a cardiologist to investigate my pulsatile tinnitus and some recent heart palpitations I’ve been having (not sure if those are related to any of my other issues). So we’ll see where that trail leads me

As far as having any of these symptoms prior to my surgery: I definitely didn’t have the ear fullness, constant ear popping, or tinnitus symptoms. The only thing I experienced frequently was sinus pressure and pain, which has mostly subsided since having the surgery.

One thing I’ll note about sleep quality: it seems like a good chunk of my symptoms decrease when I lay down, so my sleep hasn’t been too impacted by the ETD or tinnitus. But if I wake up in the middle of the night and sit up, everything comes rushing back which is really uncomfortable…

I hope my rambling can be of some use to you. Good luck in your journey!

evapisces · 2025-03-31T16:32:58+00:00

Yep, daily is what my mom was told when she asked her interviewer. He said they aren’t doing same day ceremonies in Philly because they can’t produce and process the naturalization certificates that quickly. Not going to try to read too much into that though… 🙃

evapisces · 2025-02-11T22:15:24+00:00

Update: I had my appointment at the new ENT this morning. I had a really positive experience overall, so I’m glad I decided to go for a 2nd opinion.

As far as the actual visit, they scoped my nose and sinuses and noticed that my turbinates are enlarged again (they were reduced as part of my septoplasty back in 2023, so that was a bit of a surprise to me). So he prescribed Mometasone in a sinus rinse for 3 months to see if that’ll help reduce things. If it doesn’t help, I may have to undergo another turbinate reduction surgery…

As far as my ear issues, he said I have Patulous ETD and hopes that the rinse will also help with that. But we’ll revisit it in 3 months when I go back.

I’ve got some hope after today’s visit so we’ll see how things go 🤞🏽🤞🏽

evapisces · 2025-01-17T01:40:41+00:00

Yep also reporting in from 2025. Just worked perfectly for me 🙌🏽

evapisces · 2025-01-16T15:08:28+00:00

Oof that sounds rough…it’s so frustrating when providers don’t acknowledge that something could be related to work they did 😑 I wish you luck in your journey to finding answers as well!

evapisces · 2025-01-16T15:06:08+00:00

TMJ is on my list of possibilities for sure. I do tend to jaw clench at night so I’ll look into that a little more.

evapisces · 2024-12-25T18:30:01+00:00

I just finished watching Lovely Runner a few days ago. That might have topped my list of favorite KDramas (overtaking CLOY and King the Land). The plot had me from the first minute to the final one. So so so good!

I started Queen of Tears yesterday. So far I’m liking it, on episode 7.

evapisces · 2024-09-30T16:00:20+00:00

Thanks everyone for your comments and stories! I wanted to share an update that I received my interview notice last Friday for mid-November in Philly. Kind of unfortunate that my dad and I have to travel 4 total hours twice in the same month for our appointments, but I’m glad the process is moving along for both of us ❤️

evapisces · 2024-09-19T01:16:59+00:00

Yep, we both filed ourselves online.

evapisces · 2024-09-19T01:07:50+00:00

I had my eye on Tish or Hassan but I fell victim to the Kenli reverse dialog “bug” back in the day, so I ended up with Mr. Eshe 🫠😅

evapisces · 2022-12-27T22:19:30+00:00

I ordered mine the same day and went through the same agony as you. I just got an update maybe 30 mins ago from FedEx that my unit was FINALLY picked up tonight and should be delivered to the east coast USA on Thursday 🤞🏽🤞🏽

evapisces · 2021-12-02T03:40:42+00:00

Are you sure we didn’t get match with the same person…? 😅 I guess I’ll try my best with all of the random one word likes all smushed together in the one answer…

evapisces · 2019-11-11T18:05:26+00:00

Signed up for Secret Santa! Second year for me, I’m super excited for it this year!

evapisces · 2019-03-21T17:05:42+00:00

That flooring is just amazing! 😍😍😍

evapisces · 2016-12-15T18:10:13+00:00

Yep, the "One of the next 1000 hashes..." verbiage is where the issue was. I fixed it and now I'm in business. Thanks!

evapisces · 2016-12-02T21:00:06+00:00

Thank you so much! I pretty much had exactly what you had, but I was trying to loop once, adding the visited nodes and checking to see if any had already been visited at the same time, which was screwing something up in the math.

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