I've posted bits and pieces here and there, but I've decided to try to tell my story in a more complete way, in case it helps someone.

Initial Injury
I had a bad mountain bike crash in 2015 where I rode off a ledge, dropped 5 feet and smashed my face into a rock. I don't think there's any debate over the fact that I got a concussion from that or that that's when all of my issues started. I also went riding again a week later and got significantly worsening symptoms from a very minor fall where I did not hit my head. (for background, I was a college endurance athlete, so very stubborn and used to fighting through injuries. Also used to not giving up and seeing a million doctors until I get an answer.)

Subsequent "Episodes"
Throughout the past 5 years, I've had 5 subsequent "neurological episodes". They were all triggered by low-force events where I didn't hit my head...basically sudden movements (falling on my butt in my house, falling on my butt on ice, falling on my shoulder on ice, tripping while running, driving over a large pothole in the car). The more of these I had close together, the more sensitive I was to them. I had some bizarre and disturbing vestibular symptoms that I was convinced were related to my sensitivity to these episodes (I'll elaborate below).

Symptom Progression During an "Episode"
I noticed that the symptom progression during each of my episodes was really similar for all 5. There was kind of the same initial symptoms of fogginess and blurry vision. Then I would get nausea, ear popping, confusion, head/eye pressure, dizziness, etc. These symptoms tend to peak at 24-40 hours after the trigger and then have calmed down a bit by 48 hours. I call this the "Acute" phase.

Then there are what I call the "Chronic" symptoms. Which I haven't been able to fully shake since my initial accident, but they get worse every time I get a new episode and kind of slowly get better over time between them. These would be severe sinus pain, blurry vision, and "sensitivity to motion"

What is "Sensitivity to Motion?"
It took me forever to figure out what was actually going on here. I used to google "brain is sloshing around in head", "head sensitive to motion", "brain damage from bumpy car rides", "head hurts during bumpy car rides".

After a lot of experimentation with movements, I realized what was actually happening was that I was having a normal sensation in response to a linear acceleration---just REALLY amplified. And instead of more of a pressure sensation, sometimes I was experiencing it as pain (and sometimes that pain was lingering after the motion was completed...resulting in headache).

I can't begin to describe how disturbing this symptom was. I've read about people who can hear themselves blink. I can imagine that would be similarly awful. At its worst, when I would just lift my arm up to put my shirt on, it felt like my whole head was shaking violently just from the muscle contractions from that small arm movement. Any movement at all was exhausting. Walking gave me terrible headaches.

So what is your diagnosis?
I initially just went to a sports med clinic where they just kept diagnosing me with concussions and told me I was really sensitive. Then, when I had a lot of episodes right in a row from lower and lower force events, they started telling me my symptoms weren't real and that I was having panic attacks, as the events weren't enough force for a concussion, and they didn't know what else it could be.

I tried everything. I meditated. I went to counseling. I just grew more and more frustrated that I was trying all of these things and that I couldn't shed my symptoms. I kept having "episodes" because my doctors told me I was "fine" and just to keep driving and doing my normal life, which kept triggering episodes. Eventually, my doziness got so bad that it was very noticeable, and my doctors noticed there was something going on other than a panic attack. They gave me a note to work from home and let me stop driving.

At this point, I knew my doctors were missing something, but my cognitive function was so bad, that it was difficult for me to research other options. I eventually had a friend lead me to Dr. Jeffrey Kutcher, who consults for several pro sports leagues and is very well-renowned. He does skype appointments, so I set one up.

I concurrently filed a claim with a second opinion service through my employer. Both opinions came back identical--I had a migraine disorder. Dr. Kutcher explained this was very common. It's also commonly misdiagnosed. He says he sees it a lot in NHL players. They might just fall on the ice but not hit their head. They'll get "concussion symptoms". Their doctors will be confused. What is actually happening is they have a migraine attack.

He explained that migraine is such a broader disorder than people realize. You don't have to have headache as your primary symptom (or even at all). The symptoms can be both acute and chronic. Dizziness is a far more common migraine symptom than people realize (look up "vestibular migraine"), and the symptoms can mimic a concussion perfectly. There is no way to tell the difference besides analyzing the trigger.

All a concussion is is an energy crisis in the brain. Your nerve cells get stretched which causes ions to rush into your nerve cells that shouldn't be there. Your brain then spends the next several days trying to sort out that mess (which is why you feel confused and tired initially). It physically takes A LOT of force to stretch those cells, though. It just does. And there is a lot of research to prove that.

Now, a migraine causes a really similar "electrical storm" in the brain. It just has vary different triggers. And the triggers can really vary wildly from person to person. But a common way to trigger a migraine is sensory overload (the lights are too bright, the sounds are too loud....the motion is too great....). This is where it gets confusing. Your vestibular system is actually just 5 accelerometers in each ear. If your brain is really sensitive to those acceleration inputs, even if the G-force is WAY too low to give you a concussion, it could very well be enough to give you a SENSORY overload and trigger a migraine. This is what Dr. Kutcher explained to me.

He said it's so common for people with migraine to perceive various sensory inputs in an amplified way. basically, there are a series of gain switches in your thalamus where your brain can adjust the volume on various senses. In migraine, a lot of times these get turned way up and stuck there. That is what was happening to me. The only ways to turn the gain switches back down are with targeted exposure (making your brain A LITTLE uncomfortable to teach it to turn the gain down--without overloading it and triggering and episode) or finding an effective migraine medication.

Treatments Tried
Targeted exposure has actually been really effective for me in reducing the motion sensitivity, albeit the progress is slow. And every since I figured out what is actually happening, I've been able to avoid having a new "episode" by pushing too far, since I understand the mechanism behind it now.

I have tried two medications. The first was Nortriptyline. I worked up to 75mg/day and stayed on it for 8 weeks. I had considerable side effects and saw no improvement on it ( and some regression).

The second was Topiramate. I worked up to 100mg/day, and I saw significant improvement in my facial pain (which is normally very severe) but no change in the motion sensitivity. I had less side effects. I tried going off of it and the facial pain came back, so I am currently working my way back up on it. I also use a device called Cefaley, which is a physical nerve simulator, and I also believe this has had a slight contribution to pain reduction.

There are a few more drugs I haven't tried that I still plan to. They say each drug has a 50% chance of giving 50% symptom reduction, so I am still hopeful I can find something that could help reduce the primary symptom of motion sensitivity.

I know this was REALLY long and a bit scattered, and I still left a lot out. Hopefully it's helpful to someone. If anyone has any other questions, I would be happy to answer them.