Most of my friends know this story, but I don’t think I’ve ever told it on here.
When I was six years old, I was climbing a tree at my grandmother’s house when two kids playing with an older brother’s air rifle decided it would be fun to use me for target practice. By some freak of luck they managed to hit me precisely in my left ear. The BB barely grazed the sides of the ear canal, punched a neat hole in the eardrum, wrecked the tiny bones which transmit sound to the inner ear, plowed through the liquid-filled tubes which enable the body to maintain it’s balance, and finally came to rest against the skull.
Of course, I didn’t know any of this at the time. All I knew was that my ear hurt, and the tree I was climbing had suddenly decided to launch itself into space. As I walked into the house to seek help, the earth bounced and spun in the most unnatural and disorienting of ways.
I tell this story now, because since that day and the weeks of hospitalization, surgery, and convalescence that followed it, I’ve never felt that way again… until last night.
I went to the BaltoLUG meeting at Borders last night. Which was great, by the way. I haven’t had that much fun geeking out since… ever. As it was winding down, though, I started to feel lightheaded and hot. When I walked out of the
store, I noticed that I was having a hard time keeping my balance. By the time I got home, half an hour later, I had to literally crawl into bed on hands and knees. I couldn’t walk the distance from the car to our room. When Stacey helped me take my temperature it was 94 point something. I’m feeling a little better this morning, but I still have trouble walking, and I have to move my head very slowly and deliberately to keep from getting dizzy and disoriented. Needless to say, I stayed home from work.
I have a doctor appointment at 2:45 today, and I really hope they can tell me what this is. This is one of the weirdest illnesses I’ve ever contracted. I have no fever; no stomach complaints. My ears don’t hurt. I just completely fail at balance. Has anyone else ever experienced anything like this?
It sounds like is could possibly be an innner ear infection although the lack of systemic invovlment (no fever) is odd. 94 is really low, what is your temperature normally, and are you sure your thermometer works?
Normally I’m in the 97-98 range. 94 IS really low, and it creeped me out. We haven’t had trouble with that thermometer before. I was still low this morning, 96.5.
Not me…
but my partner Jai had something like that last year…
You might have, what is so innocently called, “Vertigo”…
Basically.. there is a virus which does cause your ear to swell in exactly that little place where the chamber is that helps tell you which way is down. this chamber, which you probably already know, has a little ball in it and hairs covering the entire inner surface… whichever way you tilt your head, the ball comes to rest on these hairs and that is how your brain knows which way is down…
However, this virus causes your ear to swell in that area to the extent that the chamber shrinks and all hairs get pushed against the ball, so your brain doesn’t know which way is up at all.. and this fucks up your entire perceptions…
Jai’s case was so bad that she could not even stand and constantly threw up… it sounds like you may have a “mild” case…
In any case.. be careful–meclazine–sea sickness medicine–does help for it.. but there is no cure.. you just have to wait it out.. (which usually takes like a week…)
In any case.. I hope you recover soon…
Re: Not me…
my thoughts turned immediately to jai’s recent condition too….
Re: Not me…
Interesting. That would certainly match my symptoms. Did she have a fever? (I don’t).
I have to wonder why the body reacts to dizzyness by throwing up. It seems like a useless reflex.
No fever…
At first, she thought she just had a bad headache.. a migraine.. so we took her home and put her in a dark room… then after eating some very salty chips (which seems to work wonders on bad headaches..).. she appeared to get better within a few hours…
By the end of the next day, however, the symptoms hit again with a vengeance and then she was down for about 4 days…
As for throwing up.. I don’t know.. it is weird.. I mean.. if you were actually hanging upsidedown for a while.. I can see the actual stomach sphincters getting all upset and it being a reaction of a physical bodily failure.. but when you are actually vertical.. it is weird…
But it certainly did happen… of course.. all the few times I’ve ever thrown up from drinking.. it usually only occurred when the alcohol content was so high that my vision failed–when the world moved–then I got ill.. so it seems to be a consistent “vision fails, get everything out of the system…”
weird…
🙁
Sounds like vertigo to me. Probably have some sort of inner ear problem. I hope the doctor can make you all better. In the meanwhile, don’t try to walk on any balance beams. 😀
What I find ironic is that I was in that very Border’s last night with an air rifle.
I’m sure they’re not related, though.