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Extreme outer ear pain: What can it be?
Please....someone help me.
I’ve visited my allergist, an ear-nose-throat specialist and my own internist.
None of them have ever heard of my problem and don’t know how to help me.
Started approx 20 yrs ago, Every couple of months I would get an awful pain on one of my ears if I had been laying on it during the night. It would happen to either ear, whichever one I laid on.
To describe the pain. It is so intense that it wakes me. Pain is NOT inside the ear but around the edges of the entrance of it. It is so painful, I can’t touch it. It will be throbbing. It also hurts tremendously behind, towards the bottom back of the ear. Can’t touch that either. The only thing that will make it go away is when I then get up and stand and within approx 30 min it is gone. I even tested it by massaging behind the ear (once I could bear to touch it) and it seemed to make pain go away faster.
The last approx 3 years, I have no longer been able to even lay on either ear when in bed because now the pain will come every time. I have learned to sleep on my back. Sometimes I would still move onto my side during night, and wake up with pain.
For last 6 months, I’ve been having pressure and achy feeling around one of the ears, even while laying on my back. Then I started getting the pain even while sleeping on my back.
I am very much afraid that the day will come when I will no longer be able to lay down in my bed to go to sleep.
I am desperate to get to the bottom of this and perhaps for first time in 20 years be able to comfortably lay on my side in bed.
My ENT doctor said my ears are healthy .... i have no hearing loss.
This ear pain, however, is starting to affect my daily living, since I don’t seem to be able to get the restful sleep I need.
I will be forever grateful if someone could pinpoint this. thanks.
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Great. Please let me know if it works for you I’d love to help somebody else
Eds body like Ehlers Danlos Syndrome ? I too have Ehlers Danlos and have had the extremely painful outer ears almost every night for years. I thought I had found the solution. Purple pillow. I could sleep on either side and no ear pain until I washed the cover and my pillowcase. Last night the intense pain returned. Don't know what to do.
I found MELOXICAM. Take it just before bed. I was having this pain, every night, before Meloxicam. Now only experience the pain, maybe once or twice a month. This has been a lifesaver.
@cyndi30107 Welcome to Mayo Clinic Connect, a place to give and get support.
Years of painful ears sounds like a long time.
May I ask, why washing the cover and pillowcase would cause ear pain? I assume I'm misunderstanding and I apologize.
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1 ReactionI've been suffering from this ear pain for quite a few years - it originated when my wife replaced our 'comfortable' pillows with very expensive goose-feather versions that were so pumped full of feathers no air could get to my ears and they 'over-heated' (subsequent discarding of the pillows has earned me little sympathy from my wife). Once started, the pain occurred every night and got so bad that I had to (try to) sleep on my back as the pain would start even as I turned my head a fraction to one side or the other - almost like the bubble in a spirit level moving off centre was enough to initiate it. Because of this, I began to doubt myself and think this must all be in my mind being some sort of self-induced psychosomatic pain ...... so it was a huge relief to find this site and these conversations (and, as others say, to realise I'm not alone and not going crazy!)
The reason for joining this conversation, however, is to report that one of the contributors (back in 2017) suggested a solution, which I tried, and found to work. They had taken a mix of vitamins (Calcium and Vit D) and had found, initially, that it worked - so I did the same, and the results are:
- Started taking off-the-shelf Calcium and Vit D in the middle of January 2021
- 10 days into it had to give up the Calcium as it was, for some reason, upsetting my tummy, but continued Vit D
- By mid-Feb, 2 weeks of Vit D brought an astonishing change and, although not completely eliminated, I found the worst of the pain had gone and I could, on occasion, lay on my side. It wasn't guaranteed not to hurt, but I did get some sleep-on-my-side nights
- Now, in the first week of March the situation is that I can get off to sleep lying on my right ear no problem, whilst the left is uncomfortable (but not really painful)
........I wake up about 2.00pm-ish (like clockwork) with no pain but then find it uncomfortable, at that point, to lie on either side, again
........I take a couple of aspirins, lay on my back, try and blank my mind, and then find I wake up in the morning having slept on either side, with no pain
Apologies for the length of this note but I really felt obliged to mention the success from Vit D and thank the correspondent who suggested it. It's not for me, off course, to persuade anybody of any quackery-solutions but I hope my positive experience suggests that there are ways around this awful pain (whatever it is)
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1 ReactionI take Meloxicam. Pretty much fixed my ear pain.
@tim100-Great that you found relief. As an FYI, increasing Vit D is not quackery, so feel empowered that you are helping your body from within. Low Vit D has been shown to cause inflammatory affects. Many Americans are deficient in Vit D. As well as many other vital vitamin/nutrients. Aches and pains often times cause people to reach for quick fix OTC meds which don’t address the real causes and can further cause depletions else where. Good for you for trying an approach your entire body can benefit from.
@tim100 Welcome to Mayo Clinic Connect, a place to give and get support.
Sorry to hear you had such a hard time getting rid of your pain but congrats on finding a solution you can share.
Thank you for the selfless act of information sharing. I think it may help some find relief,
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2 ReactionsI have been having outer ear pain while I sleep, it starts after I have been asleep for a few minutes, my problem started out with this weird feeling of something crawling under skin of my outer ears. This started while I was awake or sleeping. That receded and the outer ear pain started while I sleep. I still get, what I call, as itchy ears, but not the intense feeling of the skin crawling I have been to my ENT, GP and two Dermatology Specialists. The last Dermatologist did determine that my problem was “Chondrodermatitis” but did not have a cure. I did get a salve to try but it was not effective. In order to get a night’s sleep, I use a neck pillow that is like a full round the neck pillow that allows me to sleep with my ear on the middle of the opening. I tried the Pillow with the hole in the middle but it was very hard and the hole was too small. Plus, the hole was right in the middle and not in the position to sleep on, very awkward.
To give you a temporary relies and to help you get some sleep, I use a neck pillow that is like a full round the neck pillow that allows me to sleep with my ear on the middle of the opening. That is what I have been doing while I try to find a solution to my problem. It holds tour head up and keeps your ear from contact with the mattress. Try to get a neck pillow that is not to hard or not to soft. I tried three till found one that worked.
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