I feel that we often talk about the big potential side effects of an acoustic neuroma diagnosis: hearing loss, tinnitus, balance issues, facial paralysis, and headaches. I wanted to take a moment to talk about some of the smaller side effects that can come from this brain tumor and treatment. While some may find these issues more impactful, even when they are small annoyances these can be a real pain. I know I can often push mine to the side but every once in a while they frustrate me. It can be really helpful just to know that other people share these struggles.

Short term annoyances:

• Hematoma. A hematoma is essentially a medical term for a bruise. It’s uncommon to have them after an acoustic neuroma surgery. However, I struggled with a huge hematoma at my fat graft incision site on my abdomen and I have talked to a few other folks who had them. Essentially it makes the incision area sore and takes longer to heal.

• Impacts to hair. Hairstyles are an important part of how we present ourselves to the world. It is really hard to have this altered and have another layer of not feeling like yourself when you are going through brain surgery. https://luckybraintumor.com/2024/10/16/brain-surgery-and-hair/
• Not being able to sleep on the surgery side. It took more than a year for me to feel comfortable while laying on my surgical side. I am a side sleeper and I missed that side a lot.
• Neck and/or hip pain. Depending on surgical approach different parts of the body are stressed from the long surgery. Many people are surprised how much they hurt just from the position of surgery itself. https://luckybraintumor.com/2024/01/17/neck-pain-after-acoustic-neuroma-surgery/
• Jaw pain. This can last longer, but generally it is the worst immediately after surgery. I have heard many people struggle with tension in their jaw or even TMJ. https://luckybraintumor.com/2025/04/22/jaw-problems-with-acoustic-neuroma/

Long term annoyances:

• Muscle twitches or spasms. I do not have facial paralysis or palsy, but I still get to enjoy twitches in my eye or sometimes my upper lip on my tumor side. I find these twitches more common and longer lasting when I am under the weather. Sometimes this twitch is extremely aggravating, lasting a long time. Most often, it is brief and not a big deal. Some people only experience this in the short term.

• Dehydration issues. I have spoken with many people who feel they dehydrate easily or are constantly thirsty after acoustic neuroma treatment. I find that I want to constantly sip water as I feel parched all the time. https://luckybraintumor.com/2024/04/17/got-water-dehydration-and-heat-sensitivity-with-acoustic-neuroma-diagnosis/
• Changes to taste. I personally did not experience this, but I know of people who had changes to their taste before treatment and some after treatment. Often folks describe things as tasting metallic. Again this may or may not last.
• Clumsiness. While technically this falls under the balance umbrella, I wanted to give it a mention. I typically can balance well enough to be very safe day to day, but not enough to not be clumsy. I feel like I am missing the information on where my body is in space. It frequently frustrates me that I bump my way through life. It impacts both my whole body movement like walking, but also more simple things like lifting and drinking from a cup.
• Sensitivity to barometric pressure. I frequently hear from people that they struggle more with head pain with weather changes.
• Changes to vision. I did not experience long term vision changes but I know that some have convergence issues after surgery where their eyes struggle to focus together. The solution for convergence issues is to see your eye doctor and get special lenses with prisms that help the eyes focus together. There can be other vision issues due to dry eye, so always err on the side of reaching out to your doctor right away with any vison struggles. https://luckybraintumor.com/2025/05/14/eye-problems-after-acoustic-neuroma-surgery/
• Issues with tears. There are a variety of issues with tears that can happen for someone with an acoustic neuroma. Sometimes enough tears aren’t produced. Sometimes things get miswired and when you eat you cry and you salivate when you are sad. This can be short or long term.
• Fatigue. I would honestly say fatigue is both short and long term. Immediately after surgery the fatigue is intense. It lightens significantly as you progress through the healing process. However, I still find myself more fatigued years later. Balance and hearing take a lot more energy and so I tire more easily than I did before my diagnosis.

All of these myriad problems can stack on top of each other and really bog a person done. A single individual may have any number of these, or none at all. Regardless, there is a wide variety of not-so-fun-gifts that are possible with an acoustic neuroma diagnosis.