When Should You Stop Guessing and See a Nose Specialist?
If you live around here, you’ve got a story about cedar season. Everybody does. Eyes itching, head feeling like a bowling ball, you cancel plans and blame the trees. Fair enough. Central Texas really does throw a lot at your nose, and most of us just deal with it. But some people aren’t dealing with pollen. They’re dealing with something that never leaves. Chronic sinusitis is when the lining of your sinuses stays swollen and irritated for twelve weeks or more, even though you’re treating it. Stuffy nose, thick drainage down the back of your throat, pressure around the cheeks and eyes, smell that’s gone dull or disappeared altogether. Some folks get bad breath they can’t explain. Tired all the time too, because sleeping with a blocked nose is lousy sleep. What trips people up is that they treat it like allergies for years. Years! And sometimes the problem is plumbing. A bent septum, big turbinates, polyps, drainage openings that are just too narrow. Those things hold mucus in place a...