Neuropathy and balance

Neuropathy and Balance

The connection between neuropathy and balance has a bit of a story to it.

How your brain maintains balance is an amazing thing. First, the inner ear senses your balance and movement. Then, your eyes give visual cues to where your body is. Finally, receptors in the feet detect how much weight each one is carrying. All of that information is transmitted through your nerves and spinal cord to the brain. The brain processes the data, and voila! You know where you are in space, and if you are well balanced.

If you have an inner ear infection, it can throw the whole system off.

If you can’t feel your feet, it’s just as bad. Your brain no longer receives the right data from your feet, and so it has to operate on no information – or the wrong information.This means you can feel like you’re falling when you’re not. Or, feel perfectly stable, when you’re on your way to the ground. Not a good way to live.

Plenty of things can interfere with the sensations from your feet, but polyneuropathy is the most common one. It is most commonly caused by diabetes, but chemotherapy, other medications, and toxins can also lead to nerve damage in the feet. Combine them, and you’re really in trouble. Bam- all the discomfort of neuropathy and balance issues too!

Injuries and embarrassment

If your brain is operating without sensation from your feet – your balance will be worse. Go in the dark at night – removing visual cues – and you’re really unbalanced. This makes falls and injuries much more likely for diabetics, especially in the dark.

It’s also embarrassing, and can really mess up your day. It’s hard to go out and enjoy life like a normal person if you’re afraid you’re going to wind up on the ground. Who wants people to look at you like you are drunk because you’re wobbly on your feet?

What to do

Typical advice ranges from getting comfortable shoes to getting a cane or a walker. While these are both very good ideas, I also recommend doing what you can to improve your situation.

While many of the patients who visited me over the past 5 years believed that there was nothing you could do to heal neuropathy, the research indicates otherwise. There have been some very good studies in the area of nutrition, supplementation, and nerve stimulation. By combining these things, and teaching our patients how to implement them we have seen 95% of them improve, and some of them significantly. While the entire process is much too involved to try to explain here, I’ll give you some immediate steps that you can do RIGHT NOW.

First, practice. At home in your hallway. Walk heel to toe up and down the length of your hallway every day (or as far as you can). You may need to stay close to the wall for support as you practice. This will enable your brain to better use the pathways that still do work to maintain balance.

Second, Supplement. It’s likely you are dangerously deficient in:

1. Vitamin B12
2. Vitamin D – take at least 8000 IU per day
3. Omega 3 – 2500mg per day
4. A quality probiotic

Third, stimulate those feet and legs. You can grab a free copy of our 3 Neuropathy Tips sheet here. It outlines the three things that you can do when your feet are driving you crazy. It’s also one of the components of The Neuropathy Solution – a free training that covers all the steps we follow in the clinic to stop and begin reversing neuropathy.