Part 2 of My Vertigo Saga
If you saw our post about 2 Ambulance Rides in 1 Day, you know I’ve been attempting to recover from this weird cranial nerve “thing.” (Read about it here.)
So, a few days have passed, and I’m still dizzy. After trying to get some sleep, albeit crappy sleep, after getting out of the hospital, I took the dizziness meds (meclizine). I started to feel just “normal dizzy” rather than the intense, debilitating vertigo. After searching numerous websites and reading many forums, I found that vestibular rehab exercises would most likely be the best option to get over this crap.
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I also found that in order for the rehab to be effective in resetting the connection for the brain to learn to compensate (in other words, to “get over this $hit”), you cannot be on any meds for dizziness. These impair the vestibular nerve, and render the exercises ineffective. So, I waited until I felt the meclizine start to wear off, and tried to do some of the things I’d read about.
I seriously felt like I was drunk or something. I couldn’t walk straight, and every time I moved my head slightly, everything would spin. It was nauseating to even walk down the hallway. But, I pressed on- no pain, no gain, right…?
I slept a good bit better that night, thankfully. When I woke up, I was expecting to feel much better, and start a great day. Then I sat up. OMG. Those meds I thought had worn off the night before? I thought WRONG. The meclizine had NOT worn off. I experienced horrific vertigo and just felt like overall crap. It was like going backward. Again.
I started reading even more about this horrific crap, and decided that I would NOT let myself be one of those people who suffers from this for months or years. Not if I could help it. I spent most of the day wobbling around, but still forced myself to do my normal activities, making sure the puke bags from the awesome nurse, Kemper, were placed strategically around the house.
Later on, I got tired of not being able to work out or do as much physical activity. So, I took the meclizine, waited a bit, then did a jump rope workout- successfully. It took me a bit longer, and I couldn’t do very many reps in a row, and I skipped crossovers, double-unders, etc., just kept it simple. I was disappointed that I couldn’t do more, but at least it was something. And something was better than nothing.
Next up, a run, weightlifting…
See previous:
2 Ambulance Rides in 1 Day, Part 1 of my Vertigo Saga
See next:
Vertigo, Schmertigo, Part 3 of my Vertigo Saga
