Carolyn J.
Rose
On October 27th,
the earth tilted and spun.
At least it
seemed to from where I was sitting. For the record, that was (thankfully) in
the passenger seat as Mike drove down Main Street in Vancouver, Washington.
It took all my
will power not to seize his arm when the street in front of us lifted and rippled
and the car lurched from side to side. Somehow, while screaming, “Stop the car!
Pull over!” I recognized that jerking his arm—and the steering wheel—would make
things worse.
By the time he
was able to pull into a parking lot—three to five seconds later—the vertigo had
passed. I was shaking with jolts of adrenaline and anxiety, but my mind seemed
clear.
I raised my
hands above my head and asked Mike, “Can I smile with both sides of my mouth?
Are both of my eyebrows going up? Is my speech slurred?”
Shook up and
frightened, he didn’t seize the opportunity to mess with me, but gave me
straight answers. Smile, eyebrows, and speech were normal. So far, so good. I
didn’t feel sick to my stomach and when I got out of the car I was able to walk
and keep to a straight line. I didn’t have pain in my chest or shortness of
breath. Grateful to all the friends who forwarded bulletins listing warning
signs and symptoms, I self-diagnosed that I hadn’t suffered a stroke or heart
attack.
Mike wanted to
take me to the urgent care center a few blocks away but I refused. Going to the
doctor meant I was sick and things were out of my control. Going home meant I
was in charge—or in denial.
We went home
and, after resting for a few minutes, I logged on to the Internet and began
entering my symptoms. Not the smartest thing for a person with an active
imagination to do. Within an hour I diagnosed myself with heart and artery
issues, dehydration, thyroid problems, and a brain tumor.
It was time to
relinquish control to someone whose training was many levels above pointing and
clicking.
Putting on
clean underwear without any rips so my grandmother wouldn’t spend the rest of
her afterlife in a state of impacted embarrassment, I went to the urgent care
center.
Their
diagnosis? Not a stroke. Not a heart attack. Not thyroid issues.
Rocks in my
ears.
He’s been gone
for nine years, but I can almost hear my father laughing and saying he always
knew I had rocks in my head. No one ever accused him of being the sympathetic
sort.
Among the many
things I didn’t know about the human body is that tiny calcium crystals in the
inner ear can fall out of their pouch and into a canal where they roll around
and make the brain think the head is moving—in my case, moving like that of the
girl in The Exorcist.
Because age is
a factor in these “rock slides” and I may have other episodes, I’m armed with
coping strategies like closing one eye, getting to the floor or ground as fast
as I can, and taking precautions like going downstairs on my butt—not something I want to do in public.
I’m also armed with medication to reduce nausea and an exercise/maneuver to try
to move the rocks back where they belong.
The condition
isn’t serious—at least not anywhere near as serious as the conditions I
diagnosed myself with. Those few seconds of vertigo weren’t a near-death
experience, but they made me think about THE END and how unexpected and
terrifying it might be.
I got up the
next morning making all the usual vows—be a kinder person, have more patience,
don’t be as snarky and sarcastic, control my temper, and don’t waste time that could be spent writing. No more games of
solitaire, no more rearranging the contents of the desk, no more (or at least
fewer) trips to the kitchen in search of snacks.
And next time
Mike says we should go to the urgent care center, I won’t argue and I won’t
stop off at home to check the Internet. To play off an old saying, “She who
diagnoses herself has a fool for a patient.”
