Vertigo - My Story

Naturally speaking, I'm not a blonde. With the help of a genius hair stylist my hair is some version of blonde every six weeks. Because of the blonde thing I have going on I can sometimes live up to all the jokes that are out there about blondes. I can be as gullible as the next blonde over, but a dizzy blonde, well that is a whole other story! 

Dizzy is a new term to describe me and has come to define my life a little bit of late. 

Here is a song I remembered hearing at some point in my life. I have dubbed it my theme song. Go ahead, click on the link below and have a listen, I will wait on you. 

I'm so Dizzy.

If I think back I'm not really sure when this dizzy thing really began for me, I know all the way back in the early 1990's I had some episodes of feeling dizzy when I had ridden on a train, but have come to learn that that was just motion sickness. I know that in the past couple of years it has kept me from getting out of my bed at least 5 or 6 different mornings, maybe a few more. It absolutely stops me in my tracks and renders me completely helpless. I lay in bed and the room spins and I make myself sleep, even though I have to pee like mad most times but there is no way to get out of bed. It is a wonder I haven't stirred up an old UTI over the past few episodes because I would "hold it" rather than suffer the consequences of lifting my head off the pillow and making myself walk to the bathroom.

Two weeks ago I had a bad episode where I was in bed for two days and never did fully recover from the dizzy feelings. I got better and went on with my life, but surely I was not fit to get in my car and drive down the road most days. But I did. Why? Because I have responsibilities and things to do and places to go. The only sigh of relief in my day was the moment I pulled in our driveway and I knew I was home again for another day. 

This week, on Monday morning, I woke up with that dizzy feeling again, I gingerly lifted my head off my pillow and I fought through the feelings of dizzy and nausea and I made my way out of bed and somehow made it to my 8-5. I know I never should have gotten on the road, I was feeling like a disoriented drunk at this point, but the sense of duty takes over and you do what you gotta do, right? When the doctor's office opened for the day I called and was able to get in on Monday afternoon and so I went to see my doctor and she told me I had Vertigo and she tried to explain it a little bit, and then prescribed some awesome pills that magically made the dizzy go away for me and she also asked me to go take some therapy to help my inner ear issue. 

I made it all the way through Tuesday because I was taking those magic pills that absolutely slowed me down, I was off in la-la land all day on Tuesday and as soon as the dizzy came back I would pop another magic pill and keep on going with my day and night. On Wednesday morning I got up and went off to my therapy appointment, it was 45 minutes from my house and by the time I got there I was a mess, but I made it. Bottom line, I made it all by myself and didn't cause any accidents on the way! 

I entered a new world when I opened the therapist's office door. First of all...very nice ladies and so helpful. 

After signing all the proper paperwork and sitting there for a few moments the therapist, Amanda, came over, introduced herself and led me back to a table on the left side of the very large rehabilitation room. After we situated my glasses and handbag she started to question me and take down notes and then when we got to the part about my magic pills she looked disappointed that I had taken them the day before and she cautioned me that likely because I had taken those babies, that we were not going to find the problem today. 

UGH!!

But Amanda persisted and she explained to me what was likely going on with me. She said that your inner ear has a flat part and three tubes attached to the flat part. The flat part has "rocks" in it and the tubes have a honey like substance running through them. The rocks are what helps us to remain balanced. In the case of Vertigo, one of those rocks break free and take a ride in one of the three tubes attached to the flat part of the inner ear. This is how I remember her telling it to me, and if there is a doctor or nurse reading this and in the know and I'm not spelling it out correctly, forgive me, and explain further please. 

Amanda told me there is only one way to know without doing X-rays if one has a rock loose and in the tube and for sure has Vertigo and that is by tilting ones head a certain way and watching what the eye ball does. The eyes and ears are connected to each other. She explained how I was going to lay on the pillows so my head was going to be tilted downward and my chin toward my "armpit" and then she told me what was going to happen next and next and so forth. She told me if there is a rock I will be dizzy but to keep my eyes open and push through the dizzy because it will subside. She also said that most folks have a loose rock in their right ear and so we were starting there. 

After no bells and whistles really went off during the right ear procedure, Amanda told me we probably wouldn't find it today because of having taken those magic pills the day before, but we were going to try the left ear just in case. As soon as my head was in position for the left ear procedure the dizzy overcame me, I was nauseous and Amanda was gleefully announcing, "Oh, there is the rock!" and her assistant was like, "Yeah, you can really see it!" I don't know what they saw, I felt my eyeball twitching like crazy and I pushed through the nausea and after going through all the different head tiling's and then finally sitting upright Amanda was pretty excited to know which side my rock was and which side she would need to work with. She told me that only about 15 percent of the folks she helps with will have a rock loose in their left ear, it is much more often that she finds them in the right ear. So, interestingly enough, I got to do both my ears, but now we know...so I'm not complaining. 

I was told that I could not work on the computer for 24 hours and that I was to remain upright and no bending or lifting until I went to bed and not to go to bed until 11 PM last night. After 11 PM I was supposed to continue on with my life as though nothing ever happened and if something turns up from now until my next session it will help her figure out what to do. 

My eyes have been so strained the last six months or so and I felt like my eyesight was fading and I was not sure if I would ever really become a writer because I wasn't sure I would have the eyesight for it, and now today...after all that maneuvering of the rock in my left inner ear, my eyesight feels so much less strained and everything in my world is so much clearer! It has been amazing and so far the dizziness has been subsiding. I'm still feel a bit tired and disoriented, but it is a far cry from how I felt even just yesterday morning. I go back for a second session next Wednesday and hope we can clear this thing up completely. I'm hopeful. 

Below you will see a diagram of an inner ear I found out there on the Internet. In one of those tube like things is where the "rock" had landed and just by maneuvering my head around we were able to get that rock to slide back into place, I guess. It seems a little bit like magic to think that could work and I had to think about the person who figured out how to do this! Non-invasive and almost painless except for the part where you get nauseous for awhile. 

Anyway, I guess I wanted to write about it because it seems like a lot of folks are dizzy and have dealt with Vertigo. If you have a similar issue you may want to ask your doctor about this procedure. 

Now I'm just blonde and you will probably still get a good one over me now and then and I will still live up to the blonde jokes that are out there, but one thing you can't say about me anymore is that I am a dizzy blonde!