Current Events > This ear infection of mine is now hurting extremely badly.

(+) Yeah! (+)

I have never felt more pain for a significant amount of time than what I'm feeling right now. I'm trying to book an online appointment, but the website is being dumb.

Pain killers, antibiotics, steroid ear drops. God, save me.

Sorry to hear that, hope you get over it soon. Ear infections are no joke.

ReadySetGoats posted...

Sorry to hear that, hope you get over it soon. Ear infections are no joke.

it hasn't ended. gone for days from his last post :(.

That is worrisome. Good luck OP hope you get medical help soon

Try picking at it

I got my first ear infection last year after a business trip by plane. It was one of the worst pains ever. I got my doctor to load mr up on antibiotics to solve the situation.

THlS EAR INFECTION OF MINE IS BURNING RED!

My ear has swollen up so much. I don't know how I'm going to do it tonight. I did get prescriptions, but the first dose has not helped. I wish I got it earlier in the day, so I could have at least gotten two doses before the day ended.

If my ear doesn't stop swelling up, I just don't know. This pain is becoming unbearable and the painkillers are becoming less and less effective it feels like. Usually, I can meditate the pain away by focusing on the pain and truly thinking about the feeling of it and if pain really has to be a negative feeling, but it's not working because the pain is now irregular and volatile, which makes it impossible to truly pinpoint. I had to meditate really hard last night when it was starting to hurt to sleep, but I don't know if that's going to work tonight.

I'm really scared that it's not going to get better tomorrow. I need it to get better tomorrow; and god forbid it gets worse. It hurts so much, and the thought of it becoming even more painful is making me panic.

Sounds painful, hope you feel better soon

What did they prescribe you? I used to have chronic ear infections, maybe once a year. Its been about 5 years now, but I know that pain, its unbearable.

I've heard the typical anti-infective is pcn, but I'm allergic to that. So I've always been prescribed azithromicin. And that has always had me feeling better within a couple days.

One thing that helped me was shifting how I held my jaw.

Like, moving my lower jaw forward and chewing like that (like you have a massive underbite) took pressure off the canal and made it easier to eat.

metralo posted...

What did they prescribe you? I used to have chronic ear infections, maybe once a year. Its been about 5 years now, but I know that pain, its unbearable.

I've heard the typical anti-infective is pcn, but I'm allergic to that. So I've always been prescribed azithromicin. And that has always had me feeling better within a couple days.

Augmentin (amoxicillin) oral antibiotic and hydrocortisone ear drops. The hydrocortisone is supposed to make the swelling go down (but so far it has not but my ear is feeling cold so maybe it's doing something, idk).

I'm being told 3 of the Augmentin (500 mg tablets) per day, or 1 every 8 hours (but I got it at 6 so welp) and 5 drops of the eardrops 4 times a day. I'm using Advil too as it's the only painkiller I have, but I wish I had something stronger.

DrizztLink posted...

One thing that helped me was shifting how I held my jaw.

Like, moving my lower jaw forward and chewing like that (like you have a massive underbite) took pressure off the canal and made it easier to eat.

I'll have to try this tomorrow. Typically, the timing of when I eat has been good with the timing of the painkillers working so eating hasn't been an issue, but that might be changing if this medication doesn't start doing its job tomorrow.

I remember i had a pretty nasty pain in my ear back in 2019 to the point i was feeling pain in my jaw. Turns out it was a pimple. Popping that thing was so alleviating.

ShineboxPhil posted...

I remember i had a pretty nasty pain in my ear back in 2019 to the point i was feeling pain in my jaw. Turns out it was a pimple. Popping that thing was so alleviating.

I wonder, myself, if releasing pressure on my ear through letting some puss out would be worth it, but I don't want to accidentally make it worse. Not to mention, the actual pain of doing so would maybe kill me.

Kami_no_Kami posted...

THlS EAR INFECTION OF MINE IS BURNING RED!

Had the exact same thought.

But seriously, I hope this improves and fast.

PiOverlord posted...

I wonder, myself, if releasing pressure on my ear through letting some puss out would be worth it, but I don't want to accidentally make it worse. Not to mention, the actual pain of doing so would maybe kill me.

Yeah dont do this.

Im sorry for your condition tho. I know how hard this shit sucks. If amoxicillin doesnt work within the next couple days (it normally takes like three days), maybe try asking for what I would use?

Does anyone think Pi needs to go to the ER. If it is so bad he wants to cut into his ear it might be a dangerous .

Sorry Pi I don't mean to talk about you like you are not here.

Just woke up after a few hours of sleep to feel my ear literally pounding. I guess this is how 2022 ends. Maybe tomorrow will be the day that my ear infection feels less bad than the previous day, but at this rate, probably not, haha. Maybe tomorrow, I won't even be able to go to bed because of the pain, we can only hope.

How long are these ear drops and antibiotics supposed to take? It's obvious the painkillers are only effective at random times now.

the swelling has gone down significantly, but the cycles of pain are still there. I thought the pain was primarily caused by the swelling pounding on my ear.

I guess I should be happy about the swelling, though. At least I know there's some sign of it getting better.

EDIT: I have to imagine the pain still is related to a lot of fluid build-up in the middle/inner ear.

The ear feels rough when I feel it (which I know I probably shouldn't be doing, but I can't help it), but the swelling, at least on the visible part of the ear, has gone down. The pain is still there, but I think today as a whole, it was less than yesterday. The meds seem to be working. As of the moment of writing this, the pain is here, even after some painkillers earlier, but it's not agonizing like it was yesterday at some points.

I will say, I feel like it's at its most painful when I wake up, but maybe I can get lucky. Taking the ear drops in 20 minutes, and took the last of the antibiotics for today (3 a day).

I was really worried about an eardrum rupture, but I think I avoided that. I had some really bad pains, but I figured if I had a rupture, I'd have a ringing noise in my ear, and I've seen other people have gunk come out from the pressure release. Nothing of that sort has happened to me.

It's crazy our eardrums can just casually pop a hole in them like it's nothing, but I'm thankful that the human eardrum can recover quickly.

Earlier, my ear felt muffled, but right now it doesn't feel that way. The ear drops might change that in a moment, but that's a good sign I think. Don't want to build my hope up too much in case it suddenly reverses and I have really bad pains again. Any pain that brings me to the brink of tears is not a friend of mine is all I'll say.

From my experience, that timeline for recovery tracks. I'm confident you'll feel totally fine in like 5 days.

Go see an actual ear specialist. My girlfriend had a really bad ear infection awhile ago. All of her doctors just kept telling her it's swimmer's ear, gave her antibiotics and all that, and it only helped momentarily. She finally went to see an ear specialist and turned out she had some fungus or something in there, they scraped it out and she was good as new. I don't know if you're experiencing the same thing she did but I think a specialist could help you the most.