2 years of throat clearing, thick mucus and post nasal drip sensation (allergy/reflux/nerve?)

Hello everyone,

I too have many of the symtoms you all described. Mucus constantly in the back of my throat. Used to develop into secondary infections, laryngitis, sinus infections, etc. I learned to hack the mucus out of my throat and swallow it that helped remove it before it gave me an infection.

I had a deviated septum and breathed through my mouth. This caused dry throat and mouth and my nasal passages had no air going through them so the moist tissue just stagnated there. I had my deviated septum fixed. It was not fun, took a week to recover, but one of the best things I did. I was amazed how well I can now breath through my nose. My mucous membranes in the nasal passages now do what they are supposed to do, clean and moisten the air that goes into my lungs. It also allows air to flow through my nose and help keep it aerated and clear. At night though, my body did not unlearn to breath through my mouth, so my doctor prescribed the following that works great. He said to use 1 inch gentle paper tape and put one small strip to tape my lips shut at night. It works like a charm. Don't worry, it does not suffocate you. You can still breath through your mouth if you have to, but it does keep my mouth closed and I breath through my nose every night. Although, my wife thinks I look pretty silly with my mouth taped shut at night.

I am also allergic to dust mites and ragweed. Make sure that your bedroom is kept very clean and dust free as you spend a third of your life in that room. I even got a whole house air cleaner on my furnace that also helps a lot to keep the air clean and minimize my symptoms.

Also, dry air is also an irritant. I had a humidifier too until I moved to Florida where the air is now usually humid that helps.

I still have mucus in the back of my throat, but I am able to live with it now.

Best of luck to you all.

Hi All -- it's been 10 months since I posted the original message, and for the same reasons as described in that original message, I was googling various terms associated with my problem looking for help, and my post came up in the search!

Anyway, here is my update in case anyone is interested/to help others and be helped myself in any way possible....

I was thrown a light bulb last December (8 months) ago, when a very thorough ENT noticed consistently swollen adenoids over the past 4x he saw me throughout a 4 months period. He said he wasn't sure if it was causing the mucosa inflammation/thick mucus/nose blocking/throat mucus, but it was his last resort. So with that being said, I got a 2nd opinion and he said the same thing.

That same week I went for adenoidectomy (had the adenoids removed). This was after various culture/lab tests to ensure it wasn't caused by something like a tumor. Surgery went well and after about 2 weeks everything had healed. However, the same problems/sensations/feeling continued, so basically, it did absolutely nothing. What a massive waste of time, effort and money that was...

I was obviously very upset and had no where to go next, and so upon revieiwing my medical history, decided to rack up the meds that made me experience any degree of improvement (excluding decongestants/pseudoephedrine!). I started taking Singulair, Levocetirizine, Mucinex and doing nasal saline rinses 2x per day. It seemed to help a lot but that was only because after taking nothing for a month, I was completely blocked, sneezing all the time and ridiculously mucousy in the nose and throat -- it was really difficult to deal with. So in summary, it helped things a bit.

Continued self-medicating for the next 3 months, and I'll be honest, the day-to-day was still very difficult and what ever the meds were doing were not enough to allow me to get on with normal life.

I decided to come off everything, and started taking this natural decongestant called GeloMyrtol. It's made of Eucalyptus essential oils and it somewhat helped with thinning the thick mucus that in my throat and nose all day every day. However, again, it was just wasn't enough.

2 months ago I went back to one of the ENTs I previously saw, had another scope and they said they saw some discharge but it wasn't enough to explain how badly I was feeling. I demanded they rule out reflux, of which he said the pH imedence test is only necessary to confirm LPR, if the flexible endoscopy he performed clearly showed some inflammation in my throat. Obviously my throat looked absolutely fine and so any form of reflux was entirely ruled out.

Right now, I'm still struggling every day and I'm extremely withdrawn from the situations/activities I used to get involved with 3 years ago. I'm not making this into an emotional/psychological topic, but put simply, this is the impact this piece of s**t has had on my life.

Further to that, drugs-wise I'm spraying Azelastine (nasal antihistamine) up my nose, 2x2 puffs a day, which absolutely helps in keeping my nose clear (i.e. I can breathe absolutely fine through my nose), but I still get that horrible feeling of something stuck at the back of the nose, and the thick mucus sitting in the throat. I'm on Singulair again to help with that but unfortunately it's not actually helping with anything.

I've always said this is nothing to do with allergies, because I tried leaving the country I'm in for 2 months and nothing changed, as well as the fact I've been on 3-4 weeks business trips including one to a very remote/non-industrial place, but absolutely nothing changed with my symptoms. Although, interestingly, when I take zero medication, my thick mucus seems to turn more thin around the nose area, yet I start sneezing and get bunged up a lot... I guess the antihistamines have a drying effect which makes me less runny/sneezy. Problem is though that nothing is seeming to prevent the severity of the mucus formation itself (which is being caused by inflammation for what ever reason).

Anyway (again and finally), life goes on for now, and the very worst of days, I take a heavy dose of pseudoephedrine to give a big f-u to this problem, because it's still the only thing that seems to make everything disappear (including the throat mucus!).

Thanks for reading and please continue to share your own experiences/opinions.