Tunnel
thursday, May 3 was a friend's birthday. "I'm just having a quiet dinner party", well then of course i could handle it. i was doing so well after all - i had the strength of ten men! so, we went to the dinner party.
the excursion was doomed from the start, our taxi driver took us the wrong way down a 'one way' street- we didn't know the exact adress and didn't understand his question about which route to take. no one's fault, but it did mean that we had to get out of the taxi and walk quite a distance to her flat and then climb the many stairs to the 5th floor. i was already starting to feel woozy and ill and i should've just called it quits. but i was so determined to be normal again, i so badly wanted to join normal society that i ignored the warning signs. obviously i hadn't learnt my lesson, i was still overdoing things and not listening to my body (Worse).
we got to the flat and it was great to be there and she was very happy that we had come. but, i was useless most of the time, rendered catatonic by the music, the cigarette smoke and the white noise of many voices all talking at once. of course, i tried to shake myself out of my 'rabbit in the headlights' phase and would force myself to have brief conversations with people, but then my brain would just shut down again. i spent most of the evening staring blankly into space, trying to make sense of all the commotion around me. i even had some wine i was so desperate to join in. it was good to be with friends and talk, but it was all just a bit too hectic for me.
friday, May 4 i was feeling a bit unbalanced and tired from the night before, but i walk every day - so i went for a walk. now, i don't walk far, but i end up taking so many photographs of every little thing that i am often outside for over an hour. by the weekend, i was having convulsions again! i hadn't had a convulsion in 3 weeks and now i felt like i was back to where i had started. it was very scary and depressing for colin and i. we had forgotten how to deal with the convulsions and we had been so cock-sure of my amazing progress. monday, May 7 i took things very easy. symptoms that had all but disappeared started returning, nausea, frequent muscle spasms, vertigo, imbalance and blurred vision.
tuesday, May 8 i saw dr. chung, who was happy with my progress. colin and i were so happy that we decided to go for dinner, vietnamese. we took the wheelchair, but after the visit to the hospital, dinner at a restaurant was too much. i had two convulsions that night. i was broken, i hadn't improved, i was backsliding. the reality of how long it is really going to take me to recover came crashing down on me. i had had 3 good weeks and thought i was cured, but now i know - 12 -18 months. i have had to start getting up slowly again, no more photo taking on my little walks, if i go for a walk. i am an invalid again. so this is what i have to look forward to; painstaking, often unnoticeable improvement, torturously slow, boring, frustrating, depressing recovery. and to top it all off, i wet the bed on wednesday night (May 9). i don't know why my brain couldn't wake me up, i hadn't taken a lot of drugs that night. i just hope it doesn't happen again.
i know there is 'a light at the end of the tunnel', but the tunnel is just so damn long that i have trouble seeing it.
