This story occurs one week ago:
I barely remember the drive home. My
mind focuses on the tight grip of the steering wheel and I barely
feel my limbs as I shut off the car and grab my bags before walking
into the house. I give a mumbled greeting to my father as I wobble
over to my room. I set my things down on the bed, turn around, and
promptly kneel on the floor. As I fall onto my side, all I can think
of is how nice it is to just rest for a bit on solid ground.
Some
minutes later, the voice in the back of my mind screeching to grab my
cell phone out of my bag that’s fallen to the floor to call for
help manages to pierce through the dizziness and numb feeling of my thoughts. I shuffle slowly,
already feeling tears dripping down my cheeks as my body starts
reacting to the stress of being unable to distinguish up from down.
The world tilts, and my phone is in my hand. My skull feels too tight, there is a pounding pain in my sinuses, and
I feel as though I'm stuffed with cotton balls. I’m distantly aware I need to move my
fingers on the touch screen of the phone, but it’s all I can do is grip the device tight in my hand to assure my body that I’m not about to fall into an
empty abyss and recite the mantra that the tilting sensation will pass. I lay down again and
close my eyes, trying to keep breathing through the panic that’s
beginning to overwhelm me.
That is the position my father finds me
in some minutes later, and promptly screams for my mom and brother to
come help him guide me through another episode of overwhelming
vertigo. Eventually I become aware of my body again, and even manage
to sit up with some assistance from my brother. Ben at least knows how to keep his wits about him even if he's freaking out over seeing one of my 'episodes.' I have to mix a dose of Head-B-Clear bath salt mix to clear my head of the congestion that aggravated my
condition, as no one could read the recipe I typed out for the
homemade bath product, or else they couldn't find it in the box of bath product ingredients, but that sort of thing happens a lot around here. Apparently I have the sort of mind that is difficult to predict.
It’s episodes like these that make
me wonder if I’ll ever be able to have a normal career, though, or be able
to live on my own. When I get a bad enough episode of vertigo thanks to Miniere's syndrome or something else that remains undiagnosed, I’m
literally needing to be laid out flat, unable to focus on much
besides inane media on the internet or flip through the tv channels. When I can’t even
control my body or feel like I’m even ’present,’ I feel very
down and hopeless for a long while afterwards. Heck, I've already run into difficulties in two different semesters because I wasn't able to even attend classes. I really don’t know
much else to do except keep trying to move forward and wait for my body to become mine to control once more.
