The Vortex of Vertigo

The Storms Vortex - Flinders Island

I woke today after going to bed with a slight deadness and “full feeling” in my right ear with occasional and variable tinnitus. Nothing to unusual in the world of MS where symptoms come and go as quickly as the winter weather here in the mountains of Western Tasmania. When I raised my head above the pillow in the morning after a night of vivid dreams the whole world started to swirl, with my head crashing back onto the pillow. A nausea swept over me like a cold winter wave, so I just lay there for another 45 minutes dreading the though of moving out of bed. Sigrid was patiently lying on the end of the bed waiting to go and “water the flowers” outside.

Vertigo is a nasty dizzy sensation where the world spins uncontrollably and is often accompanied by nausea and sometimes vomiting. The sensation is similar to acute sea-sickness. Vertigo in multiple sclerosis is usually accompanied by partial or complete loss of balance which is aggravated by sudden movements or turning. Vertigo is often most acute when your senses are deprived of light specially when lying in bed at night. Vertigo is a relatively common symptom of multiple sclerosis and can be caused by damage to the area where the brain meets spine called the brainstem

The Balconord Chamonix de Mont Blanc French Alps

After being able to finally ensconce myself on the comfortable leather lounge, with my view of the lake, there ensued a day of drifting in and out of sleep. The day was spent with the occasional trip to have a cup of tea or go to the loo, or let Sigrid, patiently waiting again to go outside. The nausea was intense after just a minute of leaving the horizontal. My day was like a surreal dream of sleep, and semi consciousness watching the National Geographic channel. Looking back now it’s hard to envisage what was real and what was not. I was one moment skiing across the Greenland Icecap, then on the slopes of a boiling Hawaiian volcano, but then I was drifting onto a boiling ocean maelstrom with sweeping whirlpools of bottomless vortexes and then floating on the clouds paragliding from sheer Alpine peaks over glaciers of France. An amazing sensation. Who needs recreational drugs when you can have a day life this! In these periods of semi consciousness and near awekness I felt the sensation of ants crawling over my head, and tingle in my spine and an oscillating numbness over my scalp. Alas I think my MS is alive and well and making its prescense known to all. I have had some “seasick” pills that have eased the vertigo for now. I wait to see what the morning brings…. R

After the storm has past - Flinders Island

The Vortex

Each wave hits me like the ocean swell
Slowly dragging me out of my depth,
Swirling me with the stone and shells,
That pivoting powerful vortex
Pulling me under,
Out into the murky deep,
Threatening to crush the last living breath,
From my bruised lips,
To rise to the surface gasping,
To again be dragged down,
Into the bottomless deep again