My Personal Recovery Story & What Helped Me Heal

“And I was with you in weakness and in fear and in much trembling.”
— 1 Corinthians 2:3

During one of the hardest periods of my life dealing with Vestibular Neuritis, I woke up with this scripture in my mind.

At the time, I was praying constantly and struggling to understand why this was happening to me. The dizziness, fear and anxiety completely changed my life overnight. I genuinely feared this would be my new normal forever.

Then this verse came to me while I was sleeping:

“And I was with you in weakness and in fear and in much trembling.”

It perfectly described how Vestibular Neuritis felt.

This guide is my real recovery story and what genuinely helped me recover. My hope is that it gives someone else hope while going through this difficult condition.

And the most important thing I can say is:

You can recover!

---------------------------------------

What Is Vestibular Neuritis?

Vestibular Neuritis is inflammation of the vestibular nerve — the nerve responsible for balance.

Inside the inner ear are tiny sensory hair cells and canals that constantly send balance information to the brain. When the vestibular nerve becomes inflamed, those signals become disrupted, causing:

• Vertigo
• Dizziness
• Nausea
• Imbalance
• Motion sensitivity

In my case, a caloric test showed a 95% loss of function in my left vestibular nerve.

The good news is that the brain is incredibly adaptable and can gradually relearn balance through a process called vestibular compensation, relying on the healthy nerve to do the work. If the damaged nerve later recovers, the brain can once again adapt and relearn how to use those restored signals.

---------------------------------------

My Recovery Timeline:

• 14.12.2025 — Symptoms Started
  • Intense vertigo
  • Severe nausea
  • Could barely function normally
• 17.12.2025 — Initial Diagnosis
  • Diagnosed with Benign Paroxysmal Positional Vertigo (BPPV)
  • Later turned out to be incorrect
• 23.12.2025 — Vestibular Neuritis Diagnosis
  • Started:
    • Cortisone
    • Basic Vestibular Rehab Therapy (VRT)
• 27.12.2025 — Hospital Second Opinion
  • MRI completed
  • CT scan completed
• 30.12.2025 — Returned Home
  • Vertigo reduced
  • Constant dizziness remained
  • Felt like gravity was pulling me to the left
  • Felt like my head sat on my left shoulder
• 02.01.2026 — House Doctor
  • Second round of cortisone prescribed
• 06.01.2026 — Started Full VRT Program
  • Began structured vestibular rehab exercises online
  • This became the biggest part of my recovery
• 16.01.2026 — ENT Specialist & Caloric Test
  • Caloric test showed:
    • 95% loss of left vestibular nerve function
  • Started:
    • Third round of cortisone
• Mid-February 2026
  • The feeling of pulling to the left started to subside
  • Constant dizziness finally started improving
• Early March 2026
  • No longer dizzy while sleeping
  • Able to sleep flat again normally
  • No more pulling to the left
• 07.04.2026 — Second Caloric Test
  • Left vestibular nerve showed full recovery (+60% stronger than the healthy right nerve!)
• 10.5.2026 - Today
  • 98–100% recovered
  • Working normally (40 hrs per week on computers all day)
  • Driving normally
  • Spending time with family normally
  • Occasionally feel slightly “off” or mildly unsteady, but no dizziness, pulling or vertigo!
  • Still doing VRT exercises 3–5 times daily
  • Doctor said Ill be at 100% and the occasional slightly off feeling will subside in 2-3 Months, once my brain fully trusts the signals from the left nerve again.

---------------------------------------

Here are the 4 Stages I Experienced:

1. Acute Vertigo

• Violent spinning
• Nausea
• Could barely walk

2. Constant Disequilibrium

• Constant dizziness
• Felt pulled to the left
• Brain fog
• Anxiety
• Felt like a veil was over my eyes (Made everything blurry)

3. Residual Dizziness

• More subtle dizziness
• Trigger-based symptoms

4. Fear-Based Dizziness

Even after healing started, anxiety, sickness and stress could still trigger symptoms.

---------------------------------------

What Helped Me Recover:

1. Vestibular Rehab Therapy (Most Important)

This helped more than anything else.

I did exercises:

• 3–5 times daily
• Every single day
• Even when it felt horrible

The brain only adapts if you challenge it. Not moving or resting too much slows recovery and can cause PPPD!

2. Staying Active

Movement helped recovery massively.

What didn’t help:

• Laying around all day
• Avoiding movement

3. No Caffeine

Stopping coffee reduced:

• Anxiety
• Internal shakiness
• Dizziness sensitivity

This made a huge difference.

4. Better Diet

Things that helped:

• Fish
• Green vegetables
• Yoghurts - Mainly for B vitamins.
• Cheese - Mainly for B vitamins.
• Omega 3 - Essential to support the health and repair of nerve cell membranes and the protective covering around nerves (the myelin sheath)
• Magnesium - Essential for nerve signaling and communication between brain cells
• B12 - Essential for nerve health and myelin (nerve sheath) maintenance.
• Multivitamins

I also noticed:

• High salt foods worsened symptoms
• Too much sugar made me feel worse

5. Sleep

Good sleep was critical for recovery. You need alot of SWS, also known as deep sleep, the brain is believed to carry out a lot of the repair, rewiring, and strengthening involved in Neuroplasticity - where your brain is essentially re-learning to trust the healthy or healed nerve signals.

6. Faith, Prayer & Bible Reading

My faith helped me massively during recovery.

Reading scripture daily through Bible App from Daily Study, Audio and Prayer helped calm my mind and reduce fear during the hardest stages.

Sometimes faith was the only thing helping me believe things would get better.

---------------------------------------

What Made It Worse:

• Stress - Especially became a major trigger.
• Getting sick
• Going back to work too early
• Dentist visits
• High sodium foods
• Sitting still too much
• Overexercising VRT

---------------------------------------

Exercises That Helped Most:

YouTube Resource

The Movement Function YouTube Channel

Their:

• Beginner VRT
• Intermediate VRT
• Advanced VRT

helped me massively!!!

Optokinetic Exercises (Advanced)

The Happy Triad Physical Therapy YouTube Channel

These helped later in recovery, especially for:

• Working on screens
• Computer tolerance
• Busy visual environments

---------------------------------------

Advice I Wish I Had Earlier:

1. Go to an ENT Early

A vestibular specialist makes a huge difference.

2. Push for a Caloric Test

This confirmed exactly what was wrong and helped avoid confusion.

3. Ask About Steroids Early (Not for everyone)

For me, cortisone seemed to help speed up recovery significantly.

4. Stop Coffee Immediately

This reduced anxiety and dizziness more than I expected.

---------------------------------------

Final Thoughts:

If you are currently going through Vestibular Neuritis, I know how scary and exhausting it feels. It took me 4 Months, 3 weeks to get here (4 Months not working - fully focused on VRT and recovery)

Recovery is slow.
Some days feel hopeless.
Some days feel like setbacks.

But healing can happen!

Today I:

• Work normally
• Drive normally
• Spend time with family normally
• Feel 98–100% recovered

Most days I completely forget I ever had Vestibular Neuritis.

My advice:
Keep moving.
Stay consistent.
Trust the process.
And do not lose faith.

“I praise You because I am fearfully and wonderfully made.”
— Psalm 139:14

We are beautifully and wonderfully made.

Sometimes we do not understand why difficult seasons happen, but God has a plan even when we cannot yet see it.

Trust your body.
Trust God.
And don’t give up.

Sending love to anyone currently fighting Vestibular Neuritis. You are stronger than you think, and there is a very good chance you will feel normal again.