Hi everyone. I've been lurking around this and other similar threads for a while now and I thought I'd share my experience. I had / have the same problem and I had a doctor find the reason. This won't apply to everyone, but if you have your wisdom teeth and are having this problem. You should look into this. I had a molar extracted about 6 months ago after a dirt bike accident. (had a rock hit me in the face, wasn't wearing a helmet, my own fault.) It split my lip and cracked my bottom right molar. I went to one of those walk in urgent care places and the clown just gave me 3 stitches and said, "I don't work on teeth" To his credit he did a VERY good job on the stitches, the scar is practically non existent. Aside from that, the tooth ended up getting infected and my dentist extracted it about 3 months after the accident.
It was causing the same symptoms until it was extracted. (even without alcohol) Then it went away for about 4 months after the extraction. About a month ago it came (only while drinking at first) back and I was convinced I had throat cancer. (I'm a hypochondriac, diagnosed, not in an ironic, hipster way) My mother, a retired dental assistant of 20 years flat out made me an appointment with our family dentist without even telling me. As she recognized my symptoms as being dental in origin. But you can't tell me that. I was dead already in my head. (I'm REALLY bad, the worst part is I know it)
My dentist tapped around for a second, went "yup" and put me right into X-ray for my bottom right wisdom tooth. (High energy photons...YAY!) In my dentist office, the X-rays are all done on computers with monitors in the rooms so you can see your own X-rays while you wait or so the doctor can see them in the room. I actually noticed it myself before the doctor came in. Along the side of my wisdom tooth was very small a gap, not an abscess but an actual gap between the tooth and the gum/socket. It's called a "traumatic occlusion". My dentist leveled my bite off and said the symptoms should be gone in 2-5 days, it's been just shy of 3 full days and they're all but gone.
Turns out, I've also been grinding my teeth AND clenching my jaw, looks like in my sleep. It appears to have started after the extraction. The symptoms come and go still, but it's far less extreme than they were. Today it came on pretty strong while I was at the tool store with my cousin, but It went away after we got DQ Blizzards... Hey, it worked! Plus I picked up a new tap and die set! You don't care about that... Why am I writing it?
The dentist said to call if i have a weird taste, it gets worse, or keeps me up at night. If it takes a few extra days that's also common as I am a smoker and drinker along with a sleep grinda-clencher. I have another appointment on the 14th of November, 2017 to check up and see if I need a night guard or not along with fix another tooth that's chipped from my dogs leash... long story...
I can actually go out and have a drink again! In fact, I got really hammered last night, I remember thinking, "Wow, this is the first time in a long time that I'm more worried about not falling down in public than the strange pain in my ear, throat, and jaw" Aaaannnnnd then the cops came... JOKING!
Anyway, The point is, even if you brush and floss every night, and morning. ( I don't, but I do try) Get your teeth checked if you have these symptoms. There's a good chance you have something simple that you did not even know existed. And never google symptoms. Lymphoma, throat cancer, brain abscess(that's a thing...), brain cancer. All were suggested to me by web searches.
"Your bite is a little off and it's pushing one of your teeth out of the socket slowly over time, your teeth in that area just happen to connect to the same nerve that is responsible for everything else in that area. Have a dentist file that tooth down and slow down on the booze, you'll be fine" Never came up.
Google search for "Ear and throat pain" and Google says: "THE FACT YOU ARE ALIVE NOW TO TYPE THIS IS A MIRACLE! WRITE OUT YOUR WILL SOON!
Then this comes up:
"YourLife.exe has stopped working and needs to close, all unsaved progress will be lost and cannot be recovered, thank you for using Skyn....We mean Google"
Sorry, I'm a little drunk and a little upset at Google right now for various reasons.(I'm upset with a website...in reality that makes sense, to write it out...) Ok! Focus!
I Figured this might help some people, Maybe at least it will help you worry a bit less. If you're anything like me...well...
You don't have cancer, but get it checked, even if you do doctors have lasers and positron scanners and sh*t now. They can probably cure you.
PS. Yeah... I read that back to myself... Might as well make every post, even the serious ones an adventure, right? ENJOY!
I have had shooting pains in my ears and jaw upon consuming alcohol for about 3 or 4 years now (I've been drinking over 10 years). Sometimes it doesn't happen, sometimes it does. This can be with beer, wine, cocktails... (only thing that doesn't seem to cause it - ever - is whiskey). The two doctors I have asked have not been able to give me an answer, so I started seeking my own. I found this forum about a 2 years ago but never read too far into it (because it wasn't that big of a problem yet).
Yeah so, this started out as a mild inconvenience that I could get to go away by chewing a couple bites of food. Then I started to need gum to relieve the pain. Usually the relief was instant. However... In the last couple months it is taking longer for the pain to subside. My old gum trick is not working as well. To me this means whatever the problem is, it has progressed and worsened over the years.
Then tonight happened. I came home from work and decided to drink a beer (wheat) and within the first sip I could feel the pain/pressure begin to build up. I drank about 3 more sips before wising up and instantly went to get some gum. Like I said, the gum trick hasn't worked as well recently, but it still works eventually. Well this time it didn't, at all. A bit worried, I sat there chewing for a good 20 mins before I started feeling frantic. I went to all my usual go-to's for random weird pain - colloidal silver, arnica, lymph cleanser, hydrogen peroxide. Now I was a couple hours deep with extreme shooting pain in my ear and jaw, nothing was working, and felt like I was losing my mind. I decided to go lay down and breathe deeply for a while. The pain began to subside slowly, very slowly, with time. That's when I looked around and found this forum again.
Still with a bit of pain in one ear, I decided to drink some airborne as its the only thing I currently have with vitamin c. Indeed, the pain began to subside. However keep in mind that it had also been a couple hours into the pain (which most people on here say is when theirs starts to naturally go away). I cannot guarantee a direct correlation between vitamin C and instant relief from this now very annoying and painful problem, but next time it happens (IF and WHEN I can convince myself to drink again), I will have orange juice right next to me. I plan on reporting back again at that time. Good luck to everyone else on here.
I have found that putting vix vapor rub on a cotton ball and putting it in your ear realizes the pain. I have red about doing this on a site telling all vix was good for and that was one of them. It really helps me, I hope it helps you too.