It's been one of those weeks....

I don't want to disappear just because I don't feel well. There are times that if that's how this will be, I may not post for days, weeks, or sadly months at a time. When the struggles from my health kick in it takes every bit that I have to make it to work each day. Just keeping my job takes all the energy I possibly have to give, and sadly, even some I don't. That's how this week has been. It hasn't left much free time for fanciful thoughts or daydreaming. Just a chore to get out of bed and get to work, then go back home and back to bed. I haven't felt like talking, writing, reading, walking Riley, even watching tv would take too much energy. So this week has been a hiding under the covers waiting for the newest downturn to pass kind of week.

I am grateful though, the intense ones seem to be further between and when I do regain some of my strength and energy, the 'good' days are much better than they used to be. So, I'm thankful.

I should have known it was coming on. I was feeling so good last week. Creative, hopeful, energetic (ok, energetic for me). That's usually the first sign. Apparently my body doesn't have the energy to allow for too many good, fun days in a row. Friday came, I felt good. Hung out with Mariah and we had a nice fun evening at home. Music, firepit outside, fish and chips, yes, it was a fun day. Then Saturday we enjoyed an outing to the Aloha Fest. That was a blast! It was almost 90 degrees and I was able to walk around outside! Now that peeps, is a true blessing! Last year being outside in 90 degrees would have me running to the nearest toilet to heave and vomit for the next 20 minutes. Sorry for the graphics, thats just how it was. It only happened on average a few times a day. Wow, that was misery! So I'm walking around, listening to fabulous music, seeing all the art, buying some new board shorts, a sarong or two, a few plumeria cuttings that I'm trying to grow, even some fabric to make curtains for our new Teardrop and just having a wonderful time. Even sat at the beer garden for a couple of beers (it's been sooo long since I've been able to enjoy beer without becoming nauseated). It was truly a great day. Went back home, relaxed.. a friend stopped over for a drink, then it started. The spinning.

I hate the spinning. One moment I'm happy and feeling well, the next I become overly happy, my eyes start to swell, fluid immediately builds up in my body causing me to gain 10 lbs in an hour at times and suddenly my balance is gone, I'm slurring my words, becoming belligerent. It's humiliating. Honestly. Yes, you could say I'd had too much to drink, but that's not it. Trust me. There are times it happens and I've hardly had anything at all. But it does happen when I've been running, and feeling good, and having fun. Then I feel like an ass. It knocks me down a notch or two. Or three. Saturday wasn't the worst one though. I went on to bed, after becoming sick at my stomach and deciding that was best way out, and awoke Sunday feeling fine. Some errands, some planting in the backyard, a nice afternoon visit with Paul, Helen and Mateo, it was good times. Nice dinner of grilled fish tacos, (with all the condiments straight from the local carniceria, yum!!) and early bedtime. I'm ready for the week.

Or so I thought. Monday was not a good day, but I had promised my brother I'd stop by his place and with my new little nephew growing like a weed, that's what I did. An hour or two at his house, a few laughs and guess what.. I start to spin. At first I think I'm okay. Only once I got home and went to walk Riley and realized the unsteadiness of my gait and my slurring speech did I realize how bad it was getting. Once home the nausea, confusion and fatigue hit so hard that without saying a word, I'm on the bed. I'm done. I'm too dizzy to even get up and get ready for bed. Mariah gets me situated for the night and takes care of everything else around the house I had yet to do, like feed Riley for example. Thank God for her. I honestly don't know what I would do without her sometimes.

Tuesday morning I felt dead. It took everything I had to get up and ready for work. The dizziness was back. The puffy face. The brain fog and slowed speech, not being able to find the right words. I couldn't wait to go home and go to bed. That's exactly what I did. In bed at 2:30, up at 4:00, in bed at 5:00, up at 5:45 for dinner, back in bed for the night at 6:45. Doesn't that sound like fun?

The rest of the week has been just getting through. It's like the living dead. That's what it feels like. You go through the motions of life, doing just enough to get by, feeling nothing really but emptiness and exhaustion and praying to wake up and it be gone for a while. Fearing it's next return, but grateful that the visits are fewer and fewer between, and for as ugly and miserable as it is, when I look back, it's truly nothing to how it used to be.

Sometimes I feel that I've lost the last year and half of my life to this. I get so frustrated. When will it end? Other times, like today, when I can think, I'm not spinning, and I have a desire to live, and do, and think and experience, and love and all those other wonderful feelings that are so easy to take for granted, I have to say Thank You. Thank you for this day, and for what I have, and may I be so blessed as to have many more.