Nasal congestion and pain???

[Ihurt]

Hey everyone,

I have been having a hard time these past few months. This may or may not have anything to do with my gut issues but just wanted to know if anyone else has had anything similar happen to them.

We are actually in the midst of selling our home, we are moving. Things have been busy around here for the last couple months. About almost four weeks ago I started having nasal stuffiness and irritation. It started kind of out of nowhere but there were a few things that may have kicked it off. About a month and half ago I did hurt my back moving something( I pulled a muscle in my lower back). Well my back was starting to feel better finally but I tripped and jarred my back again. It hurt so bad I laid down and started crying. Well I cried for a few minutes and put a heating pad on my back and it started feeling better again. Well at that time my nose was a little runny and stuffy because I just cried which is normal. It usually will go away in a half hour or so. Anyhow, after the crying spell I got up and went down stairs and just swept the basement apartment floor( we have a two flat and are selling and downsizing to a smaller home) and cleaned the kitchen sink. I went to store and noticed my nose was feeling a little stuffy and irritated. Not horrible, but definitely not right. I did not think much of it. I got home and my husband had just finished cleaning a huge area rug we had with resolve carpet cleaning spray. The house smelled like perfume because of it. I stayed out of that room where there rug was. The next day I had my hubby take the rug out because the smell was so strong and my nose was already irritated. That next morning I did have a period where my right side of my nasal passage was running a little, but only for a few minutes and it stopped. This definitely was not like a cold or any virus. We also had work done a couple weeks prior to this congestion starting( had a small area of wood stained ( I was not in immediate contact though, my husband did the work and it was well ventilated). We also had our laundry room floor re-tiled, but again, I was not in there when they were doing it and the laundry room is not in the house, it is downstairs separate from the rest of the house. Also had some dry wall replaced on the upper back porch. Again I was not in direct contact.

I am not sure what has caused this nasal stuffiness. I also get pain/pressure behind my eyes and around my nose at times. It has been almost a month now with no reprieve. I actually feel it is worse now that it was when it first started. I went to see an ENT doctor and he looked in my nose with a camera and said it was congested( not with mucous, but that my nasal passage was swollen). He said maybe allergies. He gave me nasonex nasal spray to try and said maybe see an allergist. Well I tried the nasonex one spray and felt it made my nose feel more stuffy so I did not use it again. I called my primary care and she prescribed me medrol dose pack( 4mg pills of mehylperdnisolone) where you take 6 pills first day, 5 pills the second day, 4 pills the third and so fourth one less pill every day until the 6th day. The first day I felt a little better. The second day it did not feel to good again. I finished the medrol dose pack and still did not feel good, still had the stuffiness and irritation in my nasal passage. Went back to the ENT and he did a CT scan and said my sinuses looked clear. He said my nasal turbinate was swollen though and said I should see the allergist. Well I made an appt to see my allergist and she looked in my nose and at the time it was not as swollen so she said it did not look bad to her. She said she did not feel it was allergies. She said with allergies I would be sneezing a lot and have a runny nose with itchy watery eyes. My only symptoms are nasal passage irritation/burning and stuffiness. I also get pressure around my eyes and my nose sometimes and get a headache.

So here I am almost four weeks with this miserable stuffy irritated nose. Nothing is helping. I am trying nasacort nasal spray for the last four days and still feel no better. Oral Pseudophedrine will help open my nose and stop some of the swelling but I dont like to to take it everyday because it has side effects. I tried neti-pot and felt it made it feel worse. My nose feels kind of dry at times so I think neti- pot just makes that worse. I even tried a little vaseline inside one of my nasal passages to see if it would feel better but it made me feel worse so I did not use it again.

So ENT doc does not think it is infection since I have no green mucous or drainage really. What could this be? I do not want this to become chronic. I need to get my nose to stop swelling so I am not stuffy. I read it can become chronic if it is not gotten under control and can cause sinus infections. I do not have a lot of mucous only that my nasal passage( turbinates) are swelling up. The only thing I can think of is that I was fine four weeks ago, I had that crying spell, I swept the basement and hubby cleaned that carpet. Something that day kicked this off it seems. We got rid of the carpet the very next day so the smell went away after that so I would think if it was that I would be better. I also am wondering if maybe there was some hidden mold or b bacteria or something in the house( although we did not see any) and it got disturbed and got into my nose and caused this reaction??? Any thoughts on this?

I made an appt to see a different ENT doc for this Monday coming up. I mean one ENT says possible allergies, Allergist says No it does not seem like allergies, and nothing I do is helping. Any ideas? Anyone else experience anything like this? I am so miserable with everything. That and having to deal with this moving and selling our house is just so hard with not feeling well .

 

[ronroush7]

There is a section in here called Extra Intestinal Manifestations. You might try reposting there. I hope you get answers soon.

 

[Ihurt]

Thanks Ron, I Will do that.

There is a section in here called Extra Intestinal Manifestations. You might try reposting there. I hope you get answers soon.

 

[ronroush7]

Welcome

 

[Julia S]

It sounds like chronic sinusitis/allergies to me... I have that too, by the way and I never sneeze but my nasal passages are chronically irritated. What helps? 3 things: 1: "washing" your nasal passage with saline. You should do that at least 3 times a day to really feel a difference. 2: Use the nasonex spray. Once is not enough for you to know if its working or not. Usually it takes 5-7 days and its way less harmful than oral cortisone. Try using it morning and night if you aren´t already. 3: Try and find out what is giving you the allergies. If you are moving, you might be getting more allergies due to cleaning your house and packing and being in contact with dust mites. Allergies suck.

 

[Ihurt]

Thanks Julia for the reply. I think it does have something to do with breathing something in. I mean we did have some work done in the house and I even wonder if maybe something was disturbed and I breathed in like you said maybe dust or even mold or something. It just wont let up. I tried neti-pot and I felt it made me more irritated( stuffy) so I was afraid to use it again. I am using Nasacort right now which is like Nasonex. I have used it for 4 days now and not really noticing much difference. I also took oral steroids, the medrol dose pack which is 4 mg pills where you take 6 the first day, 5 the second day, 4 the third day, and so on until you hit the 6th day. I honestly did not feel much relief from them though. I guess that is why I am not sure about it being an actual allergy. My allergist tried telling me I would be sneezing more and have itchy eyes and runny nose if it were an allergy.

It is miserable though. Did your nasal passages feel irritated as well as swollen? mine feel burny and also kind of just painful. I have the pressure sometimes too. My CT scan of my sinuses was clear so I guess it is not sinusitis. It is crazy how it just hit me out of the blue our of nowhere. Oral Sudafed helps but I do not like to take that everyday due to side effects it causes. I just do not want this to become chronic. it scares me because everywhere I read it says if you leave your turbinates in the nasal passages swollen for any length of time it can stay that way and become chronic where they wont shrink back down and then you need surgery to unblock the nasal passages.

Would the nasacort have kicked in by 4 days? I am suppose to use it 2 sprays in each nostril once a day. I split it up and put one in the morning and one in the evening but I have not felt much of a difference. I was not sure if it would even help because the oral ones did not help even too much.








QUOTE=Julia S;947854]It sounds like chronic sinusitis/allergies to me... I
have that too, by the way and I never sneeze but my nasal passages are chronically irritated. What helps? 3 things: 1: "washing" your nasal passage with saline. You should do that at least 3 times a day to really feel a difference. 2: Use the nasonex spray. Once is not enough for you to know if its working or not. Usually it takes 5-7 days and its way less harmful than oral cortisone. Try using it morning and night if you aren´t already. 3: Try and find out what is giving you the allergies. If you are moving, you might be getting more allergies due to cleaning your house and packing and being in contact with dust mites. Allergies suck.[/QUOTE]

 

[Julia S]

When my allergies act up and I use the nasal spray I use 2 sprays in each nostril twice a day. Maybe upping your dose a tad will do the trick? Also make sure you´re not "snorting" in the spray. Its temping to use the spray and then snort it in rather than let it stay in your nose and do its thing, right? But my friend who is a doctor always tells me "if you´re tasting your medicine in your throat, you´re not doing it right." Also, when my allergies are bad, I take anti-histamines along with using the nasal spray for a week or two.

I never used a neti-pot (we don´t have these here in Brazil) but I've heard of it. I believe you fill it with warm water right? And then use it to wash your nose? Here in Brazil we don´t find neti-pots and doctors usually advise patients to only wash their nose with sterile saline solutions, because a) it makes sure you´re not spreading bacteria or other bugs into your nasal passages by using water that isn´t sterile (even filtered water isn´t sterile) or a device that would need to be kept super clean (I'm not sure how people keep their neti-pots sterile) and b) because the salt content in saline helps to unclog and hydrate the nasal passages. So what do we do here in Brazil? We have two options: the cheaper option is to buy saline from a pharmacy (I'm not sure if you can buy saline in the US? When I lived in Germany I couldn´t find saline anywhere, just contact lenses cleaning solution which wasn´t exactly the same as that had cleansers in it as well as saline). Here in Brazil you can buy a 2 litre saline bottle and use that to squirt the solution up your nostrils. Otherwise, you can buy (and I'm inclined to think you must get these in the US as well) saline solution that comes in a pressurised container, specifically meant for you to wash your nose with... its very easy to use.

Having said all that though, I would go back to your doctor and explain the situation. They might change the meds you´re in, or look into other explanations to make sure its not something else. Could it be a side-effect to the medication you are in for Crohns? I hear Entyvio can cause a lot of similar side effects?

 

[Pesachcrohns]

I have chronic sinus issues. Humira only makes it worse. I've found the neti pot sinus rinse to really help. It clears me out. It's a drop uncomfortable the first few times.

 

[Ihurt]

Julia and Pesachcrohns: Thanks for all that information. Yeah here I think I need s prescription for Saline. They have it for eye products like you mentioned, but not where you can just buy a container of it. When I did the neti-pot I used a distilled water because like you said, regular tap water can have bacteria in it. I added a pinch of sea salt and a pinch of baking soda to it and that is what I used to do the rinse. I just felt more irritated afterwards, like more inflamed and stuffy. When I say stuffy I do not mean with mucous, in fact I do not have a lot of mucous at all, it is my passages ( trubinates) that are swollen. From what I have read it is they are the veins in the nose that expand that cause them to enlarge.

I am going to ask the ENT doctor tomorrow about upping the steroid nasal spray. I mean I Have going on 5 days now and still not much difference. I have only been using it is on nostril just to see how it goes. I figured if I had a nasty reaction then at least it would only be the one side. I was hoping it would have kicked in somewhat by now, then I would start using it on both sides.

When you say your nasal passages are irritated, do yours get that dry stuffy feeling too where you cannot breath clearly through them?

I am not on any medications. I have not even been diagnosed with Crohn's at this point. I have had tests done but my GI doc keeps leaning towards IBS. I am not in agreement with him though because I have had some tests for inflammation come back elevated in the last year. I may have to find another GI doc and get a different opinion. Also, my symptoms do not fit the typical IBS pattern. Also I have read IBS does not cause stool tests to show inflammation and my one fecal Calprotectin level I had done a year and half ago was elevated some. My GI fluffed it off saying it was not super elevated. I also have had an anal fissure that comes and goes. It will heal and feel like it is gone and then sometimes act up again.

I also have Interstitial Cystitis of the bladder which is a nightmare in itself. That is one disease I would not wish on my worst enemy if I had one. It is so debilitating. Now this with the nasal stuffiness and irritation is just too much on top of everything else. I think what makes it worse for me is I am extremely Claustrophobic so I hate having a stuffed nose. It makes me panic. I still can get some air through right now but it is swollen and I am not getting free air in, it is tight. I would freak out if I caught a cold as I would not be able to breath at all at that point and that would suck. I am just concerned this is going on for a month now with no reprieve .

 

[Julia S]

First, I'm really sorry that you are going through all this and I am sorry to hear about your cystitis. I really do hope things improve soon. As for your other concerns, just a few thoughts:

1. about your possible IBD: I would see another doctor that would be willing to investigate things further if your condition does bother you. Otherwise you might just be one of those lucky people who have very mild Crohns their whole lives, so why worry about it too much, right? But as for unclear markers of the disease, I just wanted to mention that some of us (like me) do not have Crohns in their terminal ileum/colon and therefore most tests and markers come back normal or close to normal. For example, I had raised calprotectin levels but that were still considered "too low" for an IBD (around 190, 200) I had a single balloon endoscopy that scoped all of my colon and 1 meter of my ileum and showed no signs of inflammation at all and all biopsies came back normal too. Blood work was normal. But I had symptoms and an MRI that showed wall thickening of around 5 cm of my small bowel. My GI insisted that with my low CP levels, normal colonoscopy, and normal blood work I surely did not have Crohns despite the MRI. So I went to a specialist in Crohns who explained to me that fecal CP is a very reliable marker for the typical Crohns patient since usually Crohns manifests in the terminal ileum/colon. But it's a terrible indicator when it's isolated to the small bowels or upper GI track. I had a camera endoscopy that showed I had a stricture and inflammation all throughout the jejunum and first half of the ileum confirming the diagnosis of Crohns. Point being, you read about how colonoscopies and blood work and fecal cp are the gold standards for diagnosing Crohns but sometimes your Crohns isn't in the usual places and don´t show up in these diagnostic tests.
2. Go to your doctor again or switch doctors if you feel he isn´t helping. Allergies suck because sometimes they take a long time to get better. I have asthma as well (its quite common to suffer from asthma and rhinitis) and I once had asthma for almost two months everyday. I felt like you feel now: how could this be happening? Was I developing chronic bronchitis? I used the inhalers the doctors gave me, I dust mite proofed my whole house, I took prednisone, I saw an allergist, I did pretty much everything and still couldn´t breathe properly ever. Finally I was out with a friend who happens to be a ENT doctor and she told me that my asthma was probably a secondary allergic reaction to my rhinitis. I told her that that made no sense at all (at that point I didn't know I had rhinitis) I wasn´t having trouble breathing through my nose or sneezing or anything like that. I had asthma. Not rhinitis. I was desperate enough to try anything though so I used the nasonex spray and washed my nose with saline along with continuing my inhalers and asthma medication and in two weeks I was fine. Once I was fine I also realised that I hadn´t been breathing properly through my nose at all. I was just used to not breathing properly through my nose so it didn´t feel like anything was wrong or different. That's when I learned I had rhinitis as well as asthma. I'm sorry for the super long message, I just wanted to say that I too could not believe my problem was allergic after suffering from it for such a long time and, alas, it was. Allergies, man...

Hang in there, keep trying different things, and keep bothering your doctor for an answer! I promise you you will get better. And don´t sweat about how long its been. Even after having asthma for three months straight every day I did not develop chronic bronchitis!

Sending you positive energy your way and hoping you feel better very soon!

Hugs from Brazil!

 

[Ihurt]

Julia: Thank you so much for all the support, I really do appreciate it. I went to see the ENT this morning for a second opinion. He looked inside my nose with the camera and said it was swelled up( not a lot of room). He said I do have a mild deviated septum as well but due to how this came about he does not think that is what has caused my stuffy nose entirely. He was a bit surprised that nothing I was doing so far was helping( oral steroids, nasal steroids, neti-wash, etc.). I told him my allergist said she did not believe it was allergies. He mentioned surgery( spetum surgery and trubinate surgery) but said that is usually done as a very last resort. He said he wants me to see his allergist first to see if she can help. She is supposed to be young and motivated and he said she is up on all the new things. She will likely want me to do allergy testing. I had some blood tests done a few years back with my allergist and they were all negative, but maybe she will offer some other kind of testing( skin testing probably).

I mentioned how this all came about after we started doing stuff around the house( ripping carpet up, staining some wood, repairing some small area of drywall etc..) over the last couple months and he said that may have caused this or is still causing it. He mentioned even if there was any hidden mold in the air it could cause this to keep happening if I am sensitive to it.

So that is where I am. I see the new allergist tomorrow evening. I am sure she will want to set up testing right away for allergies. If she cannot help then she will send me back to him and then I am sure surgery will be discussed. I am Not to enthusiastic about surgery at this point though. I cannot believe that my slight deviated septum is causing me an issue just all of a sudden. He did not think so either, especially how this just came on out of nowhere overnight the way it did. It could have been building up from when we first started having work done around the house though. We are hoping to move out( we are in the process of selling our home) by the end of September. That is if everything goes smoothly. We still have to have the people who are trying to buy our place have their loan people do their appraisal and okay their loan. Then We are doing the inspection on the place we are interested in this coming Friday hopefully. If I was reacting to something in our house I would have to get out of here for days on end to see if I got better. At this point I have nowhere to go really and cannot afford to stay up in a hotel for weeks on end either, not with the whole selling and buying a new place.

Thanks for sharing your story with me. I am sorry you suffer with all this stuff too. I do plan on getting a different GI doctor. My GI doctor is like getting ready to retire. He only see's patients on Friday Mornings now. It is very inconvenient. I think it is time for me to move on.

Did your doctor ever do the camera thing up your nose to look at it? If so, did they find any issues? Sorry your dealing with asthma too. My son has Asthma, well he actually had it worse when he was a baby. He seems to be growing out of it though. I know my allergist once told me people who have eczema and allergies are more prone to getting asthma. I have had skin issues since I Was little. I am very sensitive and get crazy skin reactions to medications and such very often. I get that dermagraphism where when you scratch your skin it leaves a very red mark for like minutes afterwards. My allergist said that just means you have too much histamine in your body at the time.

Sorry for babbling. I really hope this allergist will have something more to offer and to help me. I don't want to have surgery on my nose, I mean something is causing this, it is not structural because I would have had issues a long time ago if that were the case I would think. Only other thing I can think of is that with all my health issues ( the Interstitial Cystitis, Possible Crohn's or something that is causing inflammation), well maybe now it has moved into my nasal passages and is wrecking havoc there and it is going to be just another chronic health issue I am going to have to live with. I really hope that is not the case though. This is no fun and pretty miserable. I thought my IC of the bladder was the worst, and believe me, it is quite terrible. This nasal thing is pretty bad too. It really messes with your quality of life.