Head pressure, brain fog, eye problems and sneezing abnormalities

Hi all,

I'm male, 28 years old, and live in the UK. For the past 2 years, I've been struggling with the following symptoms:

*Headaches/pressure which moves around my head, but mostly stays in my forehead

*Brain fog

*Very brief blue flashes in my vision

*Dizziness

*Fatigue

*Tired, dry, heavy eyes

*Watery eyes

*Mild burning in different parts of my forehead, lasting for a split second

*Mild burning in the back of my neck

*Mild tingling in my face, especially my teeth and sometimes my upper-left gums

*Shaky hands

*Stuffy nose

*Dusty feeling in my mouth and/or on my tongue

Fortunately, the headaches/pressure do not wake me up during the night. Sleeping makes me feel a lot better, but the symptoms do start to come on during the day. The head pressure often seems to worsen when I start walking/moving about. I also feel very sleepy and lightheaded when watching TV/movies and playing video games; the feeling seems to come on as soon as I start, and not during.

In addition, I've also been experiencing a very bizarre symptom, which is an on-off inability to sneeze. Basically, I'll repeatedly feel the urge to sneeze, but it won't complete (I get to the "ahh", but not the "choo". Each time a sneeze fails to complete, my symptoms seem to get worse, especially the head pressure. Strangely, once a natural sneeze finally comes out properly, my symptoms go away, but they DON'T go away if I FORCE myself to sneeze (by tickling my nostrils with a tissue, etc). I do believe that the cause of most (if not all) of my symptoms is my on-off inability to sneeze properly. From January to April this year, I was sneezing just fine and I felt great. But since May, I've not been sneezing very much at all, and my sneezes have very frequently failed to complete, causing me to feel lousy again.

I believe my weird "not-sneezing" problem started when I rubbed my eyes in my bedroom mirror 2 years ago, and then my eyes started stinging like crazy. For a few weeks after that, I experienced the "not-sneezing" problem and felt lousy until a natural sneeze eventually came out. I find it very strange how I can induce a sneeze, but I struggle with natural/spontaneous sneezes!

I have absolutely no idea if my symptoms are allergy-related because I've never been tested for allergies.

Doctors have given me antihistamines and nose sprays, as well as nortriptyline tablets and propranolol (beta blockers), but none of them have worked. I'm currently halfway through a 2-month prescription of propranolol, and I don't feel any better.

I saw an ENT specialist just before Christmas last year.  She had a look in my nose and ears, but didn't see anything wrong, apart from mild redness in my nose, which I was told is nothing to worry about.

I had a dentist appointment earlier this year and there's nothing wrong with my teeth (referring to one of my above symptoms). I also recently saw an optician (eye doctor) to get my eyes checked, and found nothing wrong with my eyes.

I recently visited two doctors, who both carried out some coordination tests on me to rule out anything serious, and I passed every test without any problems. One of the doctors re-referred me to ENT, but they wrote back saying they don't think my symptoms are sinus-related and they recommend a neurologist visit instead, so the doctor has now referred me to a neurologist. But while I wait for my appointment to come through, does anyone have any ideas?

1 like, 15 replies