Better

April 18 - May 2 2007

Taipei green and grey

and then, miraculously, from april 18th into May i had NO convulsions! of course i still suffered from the myoclonic jerks (muscle spasms). so my eyes would roll around in my head a bit, or my neck would stiffen and shake or my hand would shake, but only for a minute at the most and then it would stop. the nausea and the vertigo also seemed to ease up. i was able to get up faster, i didn't have to do the '80 year old granny' move and wait when i wanted to get outta bed or off the couch. i still had terrible headaches and that weird crawling pressure in my brain, my ears were still popping, but i felt closer to normal than i had since november 2006, 6 months ago. normal felt sooo good.

dr. tai was very happy and said i should have more confidence in myself and in the strength of my body. he suggested i start taking walks around my neighbourhood. so i did, with dina in tow. the first few minutes would always feel weird, vertigo, disorientation, like my head was gonna spin off my body. all the noise and light was shocking at first, but if i persevered for a few minutes it would get better. my brain slowly learnt to deal with all the extra information while still being able to control my legs. i walked like a drunken, 90 year old man, but i was walking outside! this lifted my spirits incredibly. i wasn't an invalid anymore! i was starting to become ME again! at first i just did 5 - 10 minute walks, then by the time i got up the stairs to our 3rd floor flat i was panting and would pass out from exhaustion.

but i got fitter fast, i was amazed by the outside world. i hadn't seen it in so long. i started noticing the weird nooks and crannies that had always been around my neighbourhood. but i had always been too busy rushing somewhere else to really LOOK. i was and am inspired to photograph these weird images in my neighbourhood. Taipei is a crazy and generally ugly city, but it is full of the most amazing textures, weird combinations of modern and old, nature and man-made and i was/am seeing it with new eyes. i take on average 100 photos every walk - some excellent and some get deleted, but i am very proud of them and that is why i put the link to my web album on my blog. i also discovered that the wheelchair makes an excellent 'dolly' for the camera, so colin and i used it to take some footage of taipei. i learnt how to edit movies and we made a music montage, of course to a Taiwanese band (Chicken Rice), of our last two years in taipei together. this i put up on 'youtube' so that all our family and friends, who are so horribly far away, could watch it.

Going out
i even went to our local pub, 'roxy junior' on a friday night, April 27th with colin and some friends. it was a beautiful evening and we sat outside (away from the noise and the smoke) and even though i drank a soda and was only there for two hours, it felt really good. just to be outside and part of the human race. communicating with people outside of my sickbed and the confines of my flat. i know it made colin very happy too. he goes out drinking with his friends sometimes, but i know he really wants me to be able to come along. we always used to have so much fun partying and drinking together. we both want our old relationship back, where we used to drink red wine and watch movies all night. where we used to have sex. yes, i have to admit this, we can't have sex. the rush of blood and adrenalin to my brain would be too much for me, it would definitely cause a convulsion, maybe even a stroke. i can't even have hot baths because they increase the blood flow too much.

so i was/am happier than i had been in a long time, i felt positive, strong and energetic. i was/am using my free time constructively and finding my creative side again, which i had lost somewhere between work and saving money. so, good things come from bad experiences. i have found that there is far more to me than 'the sexy, party girl', 'the eccentric world traveller'. my life is not over just because i can't drink, dance and party. i found i had some friends where i didn't expect them, i wasn't a slave to the cigarettes, i didn't need to drink to have fun and i proved dr. chung wrong; i didn't need 12 - 18 months to recover, i was speeding ahead of him. "Eat my dust! Ha ha ha!"

but, "pride comes before the fall ..."