Vertigo was the last thing on my mind. But the first time I headed to the local shop with just one stick it wasn't the pain that threw me - but a strange feeling of imbalance. My head hurt, I felt sick - and I badly wanted to sit down. Unfortunately the rather handy bench in the post office has been removed. There's no rest, literally, for the wicked. These symptoms didn't occur over short distances. And they didn't last more than a few days. But they were extremely unpleasant. And very unexpected.
Since my promotion to one stick I have organised and attended The Big Lunch, been to an awards dinner in Park Lane, mastered escalators, braved the London Tube, taken a couple of four hour train rides, test ridden three fold up bikes on a (quiet) street, been trapped in a hotel shower (the tray was too high for my inflexible ankle) and taken on a new set of physio exercises. I've had a Mexican couch surfer to stay, practiced my Spanish and completed full weeks at work without collapsing at the weekends. I've harvested my radishes, planted more seeds and booked a sailing holiday round the West Coast for September.
Much of this has involved varying levels of pain or discomfort. But the exhaustion is, thank God, diminishing. The physio is harder, and keeping motivated, a struggle. My right knee continues to be problematic - preventing any real exercise beyond a dozen lengths of the pool. But walking off without my stick (left in the corner of a bar, or at the back of a meeting room) is becoming increasingly common. I like to think that this is nothing to do with short term memory loss - and everything to do with not needing the sodding thing for much longer.
Since my promotion to one stick I have organised and attended The Big Lunch, been to an awards dinner in Park Lane, mastered escalators, braved the London Tube, taken a couple of four hour train rides, test ridden three fold up bikes on a (quiet) street, been trapped in a hotel shower (the tray was too high for my inflexible ankle) and taken on a new set of physio exercises. I've had a Mexican couch surfer to stay, practiced my Spanish and completed full weeks at work without collapsing at the weekends. I've harvested my radishes, planted more seeds and booked a sailing holiday round the West Coast for September.
Much of this has involved varying levels of pain or discomfort. But the exhaustion is, thank God, diminishing. The physio is harder, and keeping motivated, a struggle. My right knee continues to be problematic - preventing any real exercise beyond a dozen lengths of the pool. But walking off without my stick (left in the corner of a bar, or at the back of a meeting room) is becoming increasingly common. I like to think that this is nothing to do with short term memory loss - and everything to do with not needing the sodding thing for much longer.
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