Tea Time

December 16, 2012 4:35 PM

Does this happen to anyone else when drinking tea?

So, I can be a pretty heavy coffee drinker, lots of Starbucks quad espressos, so I don't think it's the small amount of caffeine in the tea that's doing this.

Basically, about a year ago I was drinking tea (I don't remember which, might have been one of the Celestial Seasonings holiday herbal blends) at about 8pm when suddenly I got the absolutely worst vertigo I had ever had. It started probably before drinking even 1/4th of the tea. I had been drinking tea and coffee before that just fine. I couldn't stand up without feeling so dizzy that I had to lie down. I stayed glued to my bed for about two hours until it passed enough for me to go get some pretzels ("carbs" is usually my answer to any problem). And then I felt better.

I thought it was because I hadn't eaten much that day, but then it started happening again, no matter what I'd eaten. It only happened at night, and only with tea. I can drink six cups of tea in the morning and be fine, and I can drink a quad espresso and be fine.

I guess I do have a bit of anxiety, which I wouldn't know except for the fact that I do occasionally get dizzy and have to lay in bed for two hours (I'm 22, not 82; it's ridiculous). And sometimes I feel like I just had a quad espresso, even if I hadn't. Again, my solution for all of the above is just to eat a lot of carbs until it goes away. "Oh, I must not have eaten a lot today," I always think, although I doubt that can really be the culprit every time.

It's 7:30pm right now and I'm having Twinings black tea and animal crackers. I ate a ton of stuff beforehand, but I'm still feeling a little lightheaded. I'm staying away from Celestial Seasonings and all herbal teas at the moment. Sometimes I'll just be eating something innocuous like fish sticks and I'll feel lightheaded and have to lay down.

What could this be? Do you think it's anxiety? I don't feel stressed or anxious. I almost never drink coffee these days. If it's a nutritional deficiency, what could be the deficiency? Iron, maybe? Why does tea hate me so much?

posted by lhude sing cuccu to Health & Fitness (12 answers total)

Response by poster: Oh, I used to use honey and milk and now I usually just use sugar-in-the-raw and milk.
posted by lhude sing cuccu at 4:36 PM on December 16, 2012

> ... I do occasionally get dizzy and have to lay in bed for two hours

See a doctor about this. Srsly. This shouldn't be happening to you.
posted by scruss at 4:42 PM on December 16, 2012 [2 favorites]

This is not a normal reaction to tea, or caffeine. It really doesn't sound like it's related to anything you are or aren't ingesting. It definitely needs medical evaluation, not pretzels.
posted by Corvid at 5:45 PM on December 16, 2012 [8 favorites]

It could be a reaction to the tannins in the tea, not to the caffeine. This happens to me very rarely when I drink tea, but I've usually found that it happens when I am both dehydrated and haven't eaten in awhile.
posted by cheerwine at 6:02 PM on December 16, 2012 [1 favorite]

Perhaps read up on salicylate sensitivity. I know someone who got rashes/flushes from tea drinking. It seemed to have built up over time, and was only proven (as much as these things can be proven) when he started reacting to aspirin as well.
posted by xo at 6:02 PM on December 16, 2012 [1 favorite]

That sounds scary.... Also suggesting medical evaluation.

One thought though: coffee is a diuretic, and teas can also be diuretics, meaning you lose water when you drink them. I've had vertigo before, but it was a different kind, and it was caused by major dehydration. Drink electrolytes like coconut water to help you retain water, and have a good amount of normal water too. Like, six glasses or more a day. And see a doctor, in case this is something else :)
posted by iadacanavon at 6:30 PM on December 16, 2012

IANA physician or herbalist. IANYRN, and you should go see a doctor. Orthostatic hypotension (where your blood pressure is low enough that you stand up and then fall over because your brain isn't adequately perfused, even when your heart rate tries to compensate) is very common even in young people, more so in people who are dehydrated or who have electrolyte imbalance. It's totally possible to get dehydrated drinking some herbal teas, because in addition to caffeine many of them have additional diuretic and laxative herbs.
posted by gingerest at 6:33 PM on December 16, 2012

(It is barely, remotely possible you have something really obscure like Swallow Syncope, where the act of swallowing will tweak the vagal nerve and produce cardiac arrhythmias. But my money is on dehydration, especially given the end-of-the-day and herbal tea details. Irrelevantly and irreverently - I am sad this post wasn't called "Tea and Syncope".)
posted by gingerest at 6:40 PM on December 16, 2012 [4 favorites]

Sounds a bit like the hypotension I had in my early twenties, that eventually led to me being hospitalized and put through all kinds of scans when I collapsed. Seeing a doctor could help prevent that.
posted by melissam at 6:40 PM on December 16, 2012

The herbal tea didn't have Valerian in it, did it?
posted by en forme de poire at 6:59 PM on December 16, 2012

(For example, Celestial Seasonings "Sleepytime Extra" contains valerian.)
posted by en forme de poire at 7:23 PM on December 16, 2012

Based on this question you asked years ago, I think it's possible you could have Ménière's disease:

The symptoms of Ménière's are variable; not all sufferers experience the same symptoms. However, so-called "classic Ménière's" is considered to have the following four symptoms:[6]

* Attacks of rotational vertigo that can be severe, incapacitating, unpredictable, and last anywhere from minutes to hours,[7] but generally no longer than 24 hours. For some, prolonged attacks can occur, lasting from several days to several weeks, often causing the sufferer to be severely incapacitated.[8] This combines with an increase in volume of tinnitus and temporary, albeit significant, hearing loss. Hearing may improve after an attack, but often becomes progressively worse. Nausea, vomiting, and sweating sometimes accompany vertigo, but are symptoms of vertigo, and not of Ménière's.[9]
* Fluctuating, progressive, unilateral (in one ear) or bilateral (in both ears) hearing loss, usually in lower frequencies.[10] For some, sounds can appear tinny or distorted, and patients can experience unusual sensitivity to noises.[11]
* Unilateral or bilateral tinnitus.
* A sensation of fullness or pressure in one or both ears.
...

Ménière's disease is idiopathic, but it is believed to be linked to endolymphatic hydrops, an excess of fluid in the inner ear.[14] It is thought that endolymphatic fluid bursts from its normal channels in the ear and flows into other areas, causing damage. This is called "hydrops." The membranous labyrinth, a system of membranes in the ear, contains a fluid called endolymph. The membranes can become dilated like a balloon when pressure increases and drainage is blocked.

I think the fluid that drained from your ear that you asked about in that question could have been endolymph which had burst out of the membranous labyrinth in your inner ear and pooled behind your eardrum before draining to the outside, and that the times you have to lie in bed for a couple of hours because of dizziness might be the characteristic periodic attacks of vertigo in Ménière's. All the Ménière's support sites I looked at suggested avoiding tea, coffee and chocolate because of the caffeine, incidentally.

The Wikipedia article I quoted says the cause is unknown, but my friend who developed this also had a CSF leak high up in his nose from chronic sinus infections. Before being diagnosed he used to say that the only times he felt normal were when he was on an airplane at cruising altitude.

I think you should see an inner ear specialist if you possibly can.
posted by jamjam at 9:08 PM on December 16, 2012 [7 favorites]