Good evening everyone; I hope your weekends were good! (or at the very least manageable!)

I come bearing 'complaints'; or rather griping about symptoms and begging (it would be on my hands and knees if possible!) for any suggestions on what can be done to help. As a reference I am currently taking 1.5g of Diamox a day, plus a few other OTC things (vitamins, allergy pills...)

There are three main things which are driving me completely Scooby-doo bonkers:

1- Pulsatile tinnitus: I can constantly hear my heart beating in my right ear. And not even quietly either; the best analogy I can think of is when that bratty friend of yours blows into the cell phone when you're talking to them. It's that. But in time with my heart beat. The most frustrating thing is that when I first started up my meds about 2 weeks ago the whooshing was WAY reduced; I wouldn't hear it from the time I woke up until in the early evening when it'd start up again. But for about a week now it's gone back to being just as unbelievably, debilitatingly annoying as before.

2- Itching: This one is recent... within the past 4 or 5 days. My entire body will itch like CRAZY. Particularly my face (i'll start rubbing at my face and can't stop so I look like a crazy person having a fit), and my arms. I have a bit of a red rash in certain areas. I went to the walk-in today, and the dr there said that since it's not a life threatening side-effect to just take Benadryl for today, and then take Claritin once a day (this is because Benadryl knocks me out worse than sleeping pills and I can at least stay awake on Claritin). I've taken one dose of Benadryl and it didn't help as much as I'd hoped it would-- still stupidly itchy. I have a cream I can put on, but it's hard to put on places like my scalp and that.

3- Brain fog/memory problems: I feel like I've hit dementia about 30 years too soon. And it snuck up on me at that! I knew the Diamox could have this side effect, but thought I'd maybe gotten lucky and escaped it. But then the other day I had to try and remember the last 4 digits of my phone number at work, and made a complete idiot out of myself as I couldn't. I am as well struggling to study for a test that's tomorrow and it's all about oceans and atmospheres, and I am reading and taking notes on the earth-sun relationship and I swear all I've gotten out of this is sun = hot. This symptom is probably effecting my life the most right now. I am a full time student AND I work... or at least I'm trying to. I am having a hard time learning in school, and then at work I work at a coffee shop and when the customer gives me their order, from the time they say it, to when I go to type it into the till, I'll have forgotten what it is they want in their coffee. It's extremely embarrassing and frustrating for both me AND the customer.

I'm sorry for another rambling post... I tried to follow KISS (keep it simple stupid), but I wanted to get enough information out there in case anyone else can relate or can share some advice on what to do, or how to handle some of this.

Thanks!

~*~ Midnight Sun ~*~