LostSoul,

You are describing a very specific symptom that I have experienced before. There are a few old threads on this forum where people describe the sensation in detail. I'll try to find them and link them, but people usually describe it as "it feels like my brain is banging around it my head" or something to that effect. Very disorienting feeling, and it's very easy to worry that it can't be healthy to be experiencing THAT much discomfort just from walking, and then your anxiety shoots up, which may or may not cause evendors more symptoms (as Mark mentioned).

I went to great lengths to figure out what was causing this for me, and ended up paying a lot of money to see some of the best concussion docs in the country because I just wanted answers. It was driving me nuts. I'll let you know what I learned.

First and foremost, you can't actually feel your brain--it's not possible, so the sensations you are feeling are not actually your brain banging around in there.

Remember in normal life when you would go to an amusement park and ride on a rollercoaster? When you would crest the top of a hill and then go into a drop you would feel a free-fall sensation in your head. I would explain this as almost like a pulling or a pressure sensation on top of the head (opposite to the direction of movement). This sensation isn't caused from your brain pressing against the top of your skull, it's a sensation created by the nerve cells in your skull from the signals sent by your vestibular system (the two organs within it that process linear acceleration, to be exact).

Sometimes, the vestibular system can become more sensitive than it should be (variety of ways this can happen--I'll discuss my specific cause later). In the case of the organs that measure linear acceleration, if those signals are getting amplified in the brain, say, after a concussion, well, now you might be getting those rollercoaster sensations just from daily activities.

Imagine if every step you took it felt like you were shooting up and then shooting back down--changing direction so suddenly and violently. It makes one feel almost like there's a bowling ball bouncing around in their skull. It can be extremely uncomfortable and disorienting. BUT the important thing to note is.. .these are just sensations, and you are not causing permanent brain damage--no matter how horrendous you feel (trust me, I've been there).

Now, I'm not a doctor, so I can't diagnose you, but the "good" neurologists I saw about this all said that this is almost always a migraine symptom. Which really drove me nuts at first because I was like, "I have this CONSTANTLY, and I don't have traditional headache, etc.", but after learning more about migraine as a disorder, I've accepted it.

Migraine is a super broad disorder (that is common after head injuries). Symptoms can be acute OR chronic, can occur with OR without headache, and vestibular symptoms can actually play a huge role in migraine.

Kind of the hallmark of migraine is "sensory sensitivities" as they say. Common would be light and sound, but they can be anything. Smell, and even sensitivity to movement. The neurologist explained it to me like this: Think of the thalamus as a series of gain switches. All of your sensory inputs run through there, and your brain has the ability to turn the "volume" up and down on them. In migraine, a lot of times, some of those gain switches get turned way up and stuck there.

Unfortunately, migraneurs sometimes get in this cycle where, say, for example, bright lights trigger new migraine episodes for them, but each new migraine episode makes them more and more sensitive to bight lights. You can probably see where I'm going with this. This sometimes happens to people who have the sensitivity to movement, and that is the case for me. Got myself in a few holes that it took a while to dig out of

But i guarantee you, this symptom IS beatable in time. It just takes some persistance. There are a lot of good resources once you start seeing a good doctor, get a handle on what your triggers are, etc. Vestibular PT has really helped me. There are mIgraine med that can help that I'm currently trialing.

Anyway, not trying to diagnose you on the internet. I'm not a doctor, and please see one, but it's been a while since I've seen someone post such a spot-on similar description to the symptom I spent so many years and $$ trying to uncrack, so I thought I'd share what I know. Please message me if you want more info. I can send you the names of the doctors I saw.