Equalization After Effects

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CJM

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Scuba Instructor
Divemaster
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Islamorada, Florida
Hi All,

Here's a question hopefully someone can answer. After my OW dives over a week ago I noticed I have this popping sensation in my ear when I blow my nose. It's sort of like my ears are still popping. Its hard to explain a bit but is this normal? Maybe someone can explain this better.
 
Yes it's perfectly normal and with some time will clear up. You're probably also hearing internal sounds; your own footfalls, the creaking in your neck, swallowing, etc. somewhat louder than usual, which is from the same cause.

Basically, while you've done a decent job equalizing, you were probably slightly behind the curve, and suffered some mild barotrauma which caused a bit of swelling in the tissues surrounding your ears, and/or some fluid accumulation in your middle ear.

As long as it's mild, and continues to improve, and doesn't get more painful over the next few days, don't sweat it. Note, that if you have some fluid in the middle ear, which in itself isn't serious, it puts you at greater risk if an ear infection, so keep an eye on it. If it doesn't resolve or gets worse, time for a visit to the ENT.

For future dives, try to be more attentive to equalizing to prevent this, since with repeated dives within a short time it could worsen to the point that you can't clear and cause you take some time off from diving, a bummer on an expensive dive vacation.

As I said, you're way better off than most who post about equalizing problems, but might still want to do a search for "equalizing" on scubaboard for more info.
 
Thanks.. I have no pain at all and the symptoms seem to be very mild.
 
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