So, here's the scoop on me....

I never really thought of using my blog for anything other than to document the fun times of Beth and Rob, but for the past 5 weeks, unfortunately, there's been less and less of that for me.  I figured this would be a good place to get it all down in black and white (for my loyal 5 viewers, ha!) to collect my thoughts and focus on some healing and future progress....and hopefully soon I'll look back on this blog post as ancient history and can be so grateful for how far I've come.

5 weeks ago on 5/10, I woke up with horrible vertigo.  BAM out of the blue.  I was feeling fine the day/night before, I slept great, no problems and then woke up with my world spinning.  I tried showering (like a drunken sailor) and drinking coffee hoping that would help and it didn't go away so eventually Rob drove me to my doctor - she gave me some Meclizine and referred me to a Neurologist that specializes in vertigo.  Except I didn't go at first because after a day of sleeping and taking it easy (mind you while my cleaning lady vacuumed around me - how awkward is that to have the cleaning lady over while you're home sick!  That's the worst!) the next day the vertigo was gone!  What lingered was an absolute and total brain fog but I figured that was normal given how horrible I felt the day before.

Only the brain fog never dissipated.  NEVER.  Certainly I've had bad days and good, but the brain fog has never left, not once, since 5/11.  I can only describe it like when you've taken a ton of Benadryl and you feel super altered, like you're in a dream state - I feel really confused, out of it and so mentally TIRED.  And, when I kept thinking it would go away any day, it was fine and I just pushed through it.  I went to Palm Springs with my friends.  I went to work.  I pushed myself to be my normal Bethiest Beth.  But yet instead, I just wasn't - there were these cobwebs all over my brain and it made it so damn hard to focus.  In fact, I look back at all those pics I blogged about and I'm amazed how I look so much like my normal self when inside I felt like such a foggy mess.  I realize I've been spending so much mental effort and energy just trying to dig through the fog and "fake it", I'm exhausted.

Over Memorial Day, my vertigo came back, bad.  So, the Tuesday after the long weekend, I got into see the Neurologist P.A. and she's great.  She moved my head all over the place while I was wearing these fancy goggles that monitor eye movements and she diagnosed me with Benign Positional Vertigo which apparently is all about your inner ear crystals getting dislodged.  Here's a video on the goggles, that's my doc on the left.

Very Clockwork Orangey with the huge eyeball, eh?  It's so weird when they show me my eyeball all huge on the computer screen jumping and rotating all over the place.  Apparently, though, my eye motions are "atypical",they jump downward, unfortunately, which shows more "brain stem or cerebellum damage" or VERY inner ear crystals which are apparently tough to get back into place.  So, no clue how the crystals got dislodged.  I'll fast-forward to the good news, my MRI was negative thank GOD.  So no tumors causing my vertigo.  So that leaves a virus as an option (which they've treated with antivirals and steroids just in case that was the case).  They also sent me for a hearing test - my first one showed some problems so they sent me for a more thorough one with an Audiologist MD and that was perfect, apparently the machine on the first one was just jacked up.  Um, great.

They've put me on their spinny chair several times, which honestly is an awful experience.  I'd say I'm a tough cookie but I'm not going to lie, I've cried each time I've gone on it.  The purpose is to track my eye motions and then dislodge and reattach the crystals but because my eye motions are so atypical, I end up in the chair for 1.5 hours at a time and am nauseated beyond belief, dizzy and headachy - plus the P.A. and chair spinny torturer dude are frustrated too.  I swear, that should be the new torture method, I'd tell that dude anything towards the end just to get out of that contraption.  They've hypothesized my crystals are "sticky and latent" which essentially means they're slow to move, which makes it really hard to get them to move while in the chair - thus the long and unproductive torture sessions.

So now at 5 weeks, my doctor suggested I take a medical leave because my symptoms have been impairing my ability to concentrate so much, it was becoming harder and harder to focus at work and I was just EXHAUSTED by the end of the day.  I would come straight home, plop on the couch and sleep upwards of 11-12 hours a night, then get up and do it all over again.  At first, I resisted the idea of taking time off - I was panicked thinking about time away from my clients and falling behind with my patient access, but eventually I grew so tired mentally, I welcomed a break.  Thankfully my bosses, coworkers, friends and sweet Robbio have all been so lovely supporting me, it's been nice knowing my entire job right now is just to focus on getting better.

Unfortunately Rob had to go on a last minute trip to Japan, which at first was really hard to adjust to with all of this physical crap, but now I'm reframing it that I am just focusing on quiet and peace and snuggling with the White Fluffy Wonder.So now, every day, I get up and go to the gym for my vestibular rehabilitation exercises for 30-40 minutes, come home, and zen for the rest of the day.  Seriously, that's it and I'm still exhausted.
This gives you an idea of what I'm doing - this is the rowing version, and the treadmill version looks similar.  Not really sure why he needed the background music to dramatize it up like a rockstar but you get the drift.

At first it was really hard to do so I had to work up to it, but now I'm up to 35 minutes on each machine.  It doesn't feel bad while I'm doing it, just once I stop is when the nausea and dizziness kicks in.  In fact, while I'm staring at my buddy the little dot, I kinda zone out and go to a zen place - it's all I can do, really.  My brain starts going to places like "I wonder if that guy pounding out sprints on the treadmill next to me is going to make us crash through the floor" and "I wonder what Rob's doing right now - oh yah, it's the middle of the night in Japan, he's sleeping" and "I wonder who's going to be on Ellen today".  You know, deep thoughts.

So, that's it!  I've been going to my accupuncturist once a week and she started me on herbs a few days back for mental clarity (um, yes please!) and nausea relief (bring it on!) so hopefully that'll help.  I go back to the Neurologist on Monday for more testing/diagnostic/treatment/torture (did I say that?) to see if this could possibly be permanent damage.  Here's some more details:

water torture thingy

 I could really use your prayers that it's not more permanent - I can't even begin to think that way and just keep praying/hoping that this will go away soon because it's miserable.  The vertigo coming and going is honestly not all that horrible - I just reposition myself and it goes away.  It's the brain fog that's so awful because it's taking my Bethiness away and that scares me more than anything.  So that's my scoop and I'll keep you updated.  xoxo