ear extravaganza part 1

      So most people don't know a whole lot about the ear. I am one of those people who have a lot of knowledge about the little hearing machine. It is so complex and interesting I often wonder why more people don't have an interest in this. The story I am about to tell is what feels my drive to be an Otolaryngologist (ENT) eventually.
       When i was about four years old, I began getting awful ear pains so my parents took me to the doctor. The doctor would give me some medicine and  diagnosed me with an average ear infection. This happened about 10 times before the Pediatrician realized that this was not normal and there was something greater going on that they could not fix for me with medicine and referred me to a specialist.
      They sent me to an ENT and they ran a MRI scan and a CT to see if they could get any more information and they ended up learning nothing. They assumed there was just a bunch of pressure built up behind my ear drum so they made me have a surgery to place tube in my ear, that would relieve my pain. But what they found once they put the tube in that allowed them to see into my ear better was that what they were dealing with was not just a little pressure but it was a rare aggressive and destructive tumor that had invaded my inner ear and who knows where else.
      So with that said they scheduled another surgery to explore my inner ear and skull space (mastoid) in a surgery called a mastoidectomy. They would shave a little of my head, and make an incision behind my ear, open it up and see what they find. I was four at the time so this was extremely scary. They found that the tumor was called a Cholesteatoma and thankfully they removed it but it wasn't easy.

      What happens is the growth starts in the middle ear due to a poorly functioning eustation tube and it feeds off of water or any type of moisture, so anytime you shower or go swimming, it essentially grows. Next it basically eats your whole inner ear leaving it not working and you not be able to hear which really sucks. After that it progresses to fill all of the pockets of the mastoid bone ( it gets compared to an english muffin because of the holes in it) and when it gets to that point it is extremely hard to remove because of how intricate the space it grows is. Next it gets through the mastoid bone and reaches the facial nerve if it goes in one direction or the brain if it grows in the other or both. This is the worst case scenario because you end up with facial paralysis or brain damage.

     Thankfully they found it only invaded my inner ear leaving me basically deaf in my right ear(which really is super annoying) and not allowed to get it wet which means no swimming and a new way of showering but more importantly little did the doctors and my family know, the surgeons were not able to resect the whole tumor and it would grow to be much greater and extremely dangerous in the future.
      This that I just told you is basically the back story of how they discovered that I had something wrong with me and what it is. My next post will get to the "good" stuff when it reaches the facial nerve and gets basically to brain!!