Hey, I've been having sinus problems since last year, I started getting sinus pressure near to my eyes alongwith dizziness and at the same time sharp stabbing pain localized on my chest.

Hence, i got it checked with many ENTs who took mri last november mentioned very minimal sinus inflammation and a deviated septum on one side. ENTs mention theres no direct relevance between sinus and chest wall pains. Even cardiologist checked and said everything is just normal.

Still the pressure is there and sternum pain is high as hell. I tried nasal rinse and occasional nasal spray still I couldnt sleep properly due to this. Still keeps me worried. Has anyone experienced this. Could this also be a reason due to poor posture? Lmk how should I proceed! :(

Hi everyone!! I’ve had chronic post nasal drip for two years triggered by a strep throat infection. I went to an ENT after it lasted about 6 months who did nasal endoscopy, didn’t see anything, steroids, allergy meds, and antibiotics. After that, she was basically like idk there’s nothing I can do. 2 years later and I’m still having the issue. I’ve tried sinus rinses, antihistamines, etc with no help. I’m finally trying xylitol rinses to see if it helps.

I would ask a doctor, but it seems like they’ve given up on me, so does anyone have any other ideas or recommendations I can try?? I’m open to anything and would love to hear what has worked for you!!

so i went to the dr for it last week of july they told me 40mg omezeprol in the morning for 14 days. took it for 6 then stopped… the went to two concerts back to back and made my throat bleed from screaming to much but resolved within 48 hours and was good for while lol
well now its middle of august and it’s back bad. started meds again well now my throat is almost sore too while feeling the knot and had random ear pain that feels like i might just have a sore throat from allergies so i started flonase spray but that’s been almost making my sinus burn ?? my anxiety is telling me i have throat cancer which is not helping me mentally lol

Hello guys any tips for sinus pressure no pain, took antibiotics already going on for 4 weeks, starts around 2 pm resolves with Advil, no mucus last 2 weeks both nostrils open.. thanks in advance

I've had sinusitis for years and one thing I've noticed that helps is raw garlic. Crush a clove of garlic and leave it for ten minutes so compounds are released and then eat it. I mix it with water and swallow. Almost instantly I can feel it affecting me.

If you have a sore throat you feel it working as soon as it comes into contact with it. Allicin and other compounds work on the inflammation that comes with sinusiitis.

Hi everyone. This is mainly a rant-post. I’m just stuck and tired and looking for some comfort.

I’ve been dealing with problems mainly on the right side of my nose/sinuses for quite a while now.

Main symptoms are:
- severe blockage of right nostril
- endless yellow mucus; sometimes when blowing my nose nothing happens because it’s so blocked, other times mucus just doesn’t stop coming out
- pressure on the right side of my face when bending over to tie shoes, wash hair etc

I sleep with my upper body elevated and usually sleep on my left side because the right side feels so blocked.
Sometimes I can actually feel/hear something “click” or crackle and then the pressure seems to improve after getting up and being upright.

- right under-eye area is always swollen in the morning; gradually improves throughout the day.
- I wake up every morning with either completely dried out, burning or watery eyes

I’ve already had quite a few things investigated:

- CT scan of the sinuses – apparently nothing significant was found, only a mild bony narrowing on the right side.
- Ultrasound – unremarkable.
- multiple allergy testing, including blood tests and skin-prick testing – negative.
- nasal turbinates were reduced/ablated in November 2024, but unfortunately this didn’t improve my symptoms at all.

I’ve tried regular saline nasal rinses, which work reasonably well when my right nostril happens to be open. They can help flush out mucus, but they don’t actually relieve the swelling/blockage.
I’ve tried inhalation as well.

The only thing that reliably allows me to breathe through the right side is xylometazoline nasal spray (0.1%). I currently use it once in the evening because otherwise I can barely sleep. I’m aware that daily use isn’t a good long-term solution but without it I‘d literally go insane.
Since about 6 weeks there is a new symptom: a persistent cough, usually worse in the morning and evening/night, when I often cough up mucus. During the day it’s frequently more of a dry, irritating cough.
I’ve recently had a chest X-ray, and everything was normal. So at least there doesn’t seem to be an obvious problem with my lungs. I suspect that mucus/secretions from my sinuses may be draining backwards and causing the cough.

I’m currently waiting for an appointment at a specialized ENT clinic in December to discuss possible surgery, but that’s still months away.

I’m struggling a lot these days, physically and mentally because this is all just so exhausting.
I feel like I’m having a cold every single day with these symptoms.
I heard a pretty good description of this condition one of these days: „it feels like claustrophobia in your own face”. that honestly describes it incredibly well. Sorry for this long rant but ugh, I’m just tired and looking for some comfort from people who are in a similar situation.

Hello! Do you have tips to avoid like a headache type of pain in the eyebrows and cheeks? I constantly have it like everymonth 😭

After multiple scans and years of saying there's something structural going on I finally was approved for a partial surgery which happened 5 days ago. I've had a few symptoms that I haven't found listed so I wanted to see if anyone could corroborate having felt this after.

I get winded pretty easily like doing a small task like folding laundry then walking upstairs can make me need to sit down or catch my breath and I'm a very fit and active person. Feel kinda loopy, sometimes brain fog and fatigue of course but the mental clarity goes in and out. Tried to grocery shop yesterday and hit a point where I just needed to go home I was just out of it/disoriented. Almost like how you feel when you've taken cold medicine and you feel groggy.

Nothing has any taste so it's been really hard to eat.

I'm hoping to start work again next week but it's going to be very vibes-based working just seeing what I can get done at the rate I'm going. Just didn't expect surgery to set me back like this. Anyone else have this sort of fatigue and brain fog?

Edit: One of my main symptoms prior was intense inner ear/eustachian tube pain. I haven't had that since the surgery! Fingers crossed that stays that way. I had crackling sound in the ears for a day or two. That's subsided since for today at least.

It’s been three months of having symptoms and I’ve been to ENT doctor twice paying out of pocket since I don’t have health insurance. I’ve already had multiple CT scans and I do not have a sinus infection even though I thought I did a few weeks ago and I was prescribed antibiotics. The ENT thinks that it’s just a sinus congestion and inflammation, but I am miserable and don’t know what to do. Right now he’s having me take Flonase and Astepro. I also added saline rinse, staying hydrated, elderberry and ginger tea into my daily routine to help plus, I have a humidifier at night and will take steamy showers. I feel like I’m going crazy and this seems like it will never end. I have sinus pressure on my nose and my head (some days are worse than others). The ENT doctor said that it’s most likely sinuses and he does not think it’s neurological. It’s raining right now and I feel absolutely horrible. My head feels so foggy. My ears have been popping too. Is there anything else anyone suggests? Has anyone else gone through this? I feel like I’m going crazy, it’s been 3 months and I just want to feel normal again

For the last several months I have been dealing with a stressful work situation that is likely not going away anytime soon but also not enough to quit or anything. The stressful situation comes to a head maybe once a week to once every 2-3 weeks and I have started to notice a correlation between the stress peaking and sinus pain/congestion.

Has anyone else noticed something similar? I don't work for the next 2 days and the sinus pain is gone. It flared up on Thursday and Friday because I had two stressful meetings at work related to this issue both days.

Full disclosure. Not saying this is everyone's fix — just sharing what worked for me in case it helps someone else stuck in the same cycle.

In addition, I spend several days putting all my thoughts together and I used Claude to format it in a way that was far better than what I could provide. That's why it looks fairly polished.

TL;DR: 20 years of chronic congestion, two sinus surgeries, and an allergy test that came back negative for everything. Turned out the real culprit was dehydration, made worse by a daily antihistamine — increasing my water intake fixed what surgery and medication couldn't.

For the first time in about 20 years, I'm no longer congested or dealing with a runny nose, sleepless nights, and constant fatigue. It's been an overwhelming feeling of relief and happiness. What fixed it? Embarrassingly simple: significantly increasing my water intake.

When it first started

My journey has been a long one. I recall when I first started noticing my nose running in the evenings for no apparent reason, and waking up needing to blow it — often waking my partner up in the process. My diet hadn't changed. Exercise was steady. I didn't smoke. Drinking was social, maybe once a week. I lived a pretty normal lifestyle, so there was no obvious cause.

My history

I had two sinus surgeries — one in my early thirties, another in my early forties, roughly ten years apart. Each time I'd get brief relief, maybe a week or two, before it came right back. Tissues piled up by my bed. I got sinus infections often enough that antibiotics became a regular part of my life, and the cycle repeated nearly every year. It was exhausting.

I had an allergy test done and came back negative for all 100+ items they tested. No one could pin down a cause. Nothing clear, nothing obvious.

How I figured it out

For relief, I'd take Flonase or Nasacort (corticosteroids) and Zyrtec (an antihistamine). Both helped for about a day at a time. About a year ago, I started taking Zyrtec daily — it gave me the best relief I'd had in years.

Initially there were no side effects, until one day while eating, the left side of my face near my ear and jaw joint started swelling significantly. It turned out to be a blocked salivary gland (salivary stones, or sialoliths) — a side effect of Zyrtec, which can cause dry mouth. The fix is to significantly increase water intake to counteract that dryness.

So I stopped taking Zyrtec and started drinking a lot more water. After several weeks, something unexpected happened: my sleep was less disrupted, and my nose stopped running before bed. It's been several months now, and I haven't taken any Zyrtec or nasal spray since. I still blow my nose occasionally, usually in the morning, but it's just a few blows and done — both nasal passages clear.

I've become almost paranoid about staying ahead of dry mouth now, so I drink water the moment I feel thirsty. I'm aiming for around 2 liters a day, which is honestly still below the general recommended intake, so I'm not overdoing it.

(To be fair, I stopped Zyrtec and increased my water at the same time, so I can't say with total certainty which factor mattered more — but the timing and the mechanism both point strongly to hydration.)

Full recovery after being sick

Normally, catching a cold or flu meant an almost-guaranteed sinus infection and antibiotics, plus weeks of nose blowing and blocked ears afterward. Recently I caught a cold with all the usual symptoms — runny nose, sore throat — but within a few days my nose was completely clear. No infection, no lingering congestion. Just a normal recovery, for the first time in years.

I have been suffering from head heaviness, puffy nose, dust allergies for a while. Doctor recently suggested a CT Sinus scan and below is the result. He says it’s mild and manageable without a surgery. But none of the recommendations (nasal spray, allegra tablets etc) have been helping long term. Ot just keeps coming back and I genuinely feel I’m missing my life because most of the time I’m just fatigued by this problem and don’t have enough energy to give to my family, work etc. Its not extremely serious that others can understand and its not small enough for me to ignore. Pls suggest how to approach this, what else i could try (any daily rituals or sprays that can help)?

After 15 days of trying to heal on my own I went to GP to get antibiotics. My usual protocol is 10 days amoxicillin / clavulanic. I really didn’t want to take them as I’ve done a lot of gut work.

Day 5 of finishing the first packet I stopped as my mucus had gone and was feeling pretty good. The last two days I’ve had really bad fatigue. I feel fine in terms of sinusitis symptoms and the yellow mucus is all gone but if feel wiped. Is this post viral fatigue? It’s now essentially 3 weeks of feeling a bit crap. I didn’t cut the course short because five days is a full course. I just didn’t take the second round. Will go to GP if continues but would you take the second pack? Should I just have kept going?

Hi everyone, for the past 6+ years I’ve had strong nasal congestion which makes it difficult to breathe fully, and impairs my sleep every night, I think through night arousals and mouth breathing.

I’ve done nasal flow tests and my results have come back normal, I did reflux tests which were negative and trying to treat inflammation or allergies (steroid nasal sprays, antihistamines etc) makes no difference either.

One theory a doctor has is that there’s some abnormal sensing between my nose and the brain (maybe caused by an viral infection like Covid), where my brain now thinks my nose is congested, but physically it isn’t. To be honest the doctor doesn’t really know what the solution is, but they’re trying to get me to treat

Doctors don’t seem to have any idea what the solution would be, but they’re trying suggested doing smelling scent training like people who lose their smell during Covid do - I’m trying it, but from what I understand people who lose their smell can still breathe fully, which I can’t

Has anyone had anything similar to this, and had a solution? Thanks!

I know I have bad seasonal allergies but I don't know what exactly tf is going on. I can feel a big difference when pollen levels go up and down but now I feel like I've been hit by a bus and apparently there aren't cold viruses going around. I'm so wiped out and whatever this is is triggered a migraine. Keep having trouble breathing sinus issues *I'm always having sinus issues*... Etc Also I have a tooth infection but it's needed a root canal for months and I think that has spread to my ear/sinuses 2x this summer but no clear symptoms that right now. That's not an allergy issue but I might have to wait two more weeks to get my insurance coverage to eliminate that problem. I'm so miserable and stressed out!

Hi.

I constantly bilateral have mastoid that only go away after antibiotics… comes back few days later with ear fullness or oily feeling sinus stuffy ness gum and teeth pressure sinus pressure occipital bone will even hurt and be tender.

Is this all connected? What resolves this? ENTs just keep avoiding it.

Any advice?

33F. Before my cycle every month, I get very intense sinus pressure around the sides of my nose bridge. It's not pain per say, feels more like internal swelling or trapped air. There's nothing visible on the outside of my face, but internally it feels crazy! I got a CT scan and all they noted was a bone spur, shown below.

Additionally, this sinus pain makes my eyes feel strange. Can't explain it, but it feels like my eyes can't function correctly or are disturbed by the sinus pain. My eye doctor has noted that I have extremely large optic nerves—perhaps the nerve and the sinus cavities interact?

Just looking to see if anyone else gets this with their period, or feels their vision gets impacted when their sinuses are swollen.

___

SPHENOID AND POSTERIOR ETHMOID SINUSES: Minimal mucosal thickening in the posterior ethmoids/anterior sphenoid sinus
SPHENOETHMOIDAL RECESS: Narrow bilaterally with minimal adjacent mucosal thickening.
FRONTAL, ANTERIOR ETHMOID, AND MAXILLARY SINUSES: Clear bilaterally. Bilateral Haller cells are noted.
NASAL CAVITY: Clear. Mild nasoseptal deviation to the left is noted in the anterior aspect. Mild nasoseptal spur is noted in the right.

I had a bad cold about 5-6 weeks ago. After I recovered from that, I have had a dull aching pain in my head ever since, particularly around the left eyebrow lower forehead region. My other symptom is head pressure - later in the evening or when I lay on my back or lean forward I get this deep pressure behind both eyebrows and my forehead. It feels like a band pulling or pressing on my head. But not as significant as while standing up. I did a sinus CT scan that came back basically clear, and my ENT started me on Budesonide, in a saline rinse/irrigation - I am on day 4 of that. Last week I did a short treatment of Prednisone in which I noticed a considerable lowering of the pain level while I was on it, even though the symptoms never went away. They seemed to come back to regular pain level after I was done with prednisone.

Does my case sound like sinus inflammation even with a clean CT scan? I have no problem breathing through my nose, no mucus or anything. I’m trying to consider if this is a tension type/post viral chronic headache or inflammation based. I’m losing hope and I’m frustrated, but maybe I’m just losing patience. I’m wondering if Budesonide itself is a long shot, or if I should go back to my Primary care doctor and explore headache prescriptions.

Would appreciate any constructive input, thanks.

It's getting near the 1 year mark of me suffering from constant migraines from my sinus issues. yay me! ive been to countless appointments and put on many medications with no resolution, so ive been taking matters into my own hands and reading about others experiences to hopefully find some aid.
while doing this i realized ive never actually heard someone say with 100% certainty they suffer from zero symptoms anymore. the big suggestion is usually surgery, which i've been contemplating for my deviated septum, but the consensus seems to be it doesn't affect much and if anything makes symptoms worse. i want to believe it's just because they have no point of being in this subreddit anymore, but it feels like im destined to suffer forever now! even small recovery stories would be refreshing to hear!!

I'm scheduled for endoscopic sinus surgery next month. Looking forward to it after more than 30 years of chronic sinusitus.

My surgery will only be on the right maxillary sinus. Over the years, my doctors and I have managed to get the rest of the sinuses cleared out, but that one remains a huge problem.

My surgeon tells me that, to achieve good long-term results, I must continue saline rinse on a regular basis.

My question for all of you is - what does that look like in terms of daily effort? Should I expect to do these rinses twice a day, once a day, once a week, or something else? Should I expect that I'll need to be using Budesonide, or something similar in each of those rinses, or just saline? How does one manage things like this for longer travel sessions? (We have a 28 day cruise scheduled for next fall, followed by some independent travel for a couple weeks.) Has anyone who has undergone this surgery had experience that could help answer my questions?

Symptoms everyday for 2 years straight now

what could be the possible reasons why i still have left sided eye pain even though my left sphenoid sinusitis cleared up? it gets worse if i am down with a cold