Vertigo - Not Just a Scary Movie

The Epley Maneuver

Miraculous is not a word that gets overused in my personal vocabulary.

I had vertigo for a long time, off and on and sometimes debilitating. A couple years ago, I had a fierce episode that lasted eight months. The Adele song “Rolling in the Deep” was my theme every morning when I woke, turned over and traveled from bed to bathroom, a mere few steps. I started each day with an initial wave of nausea that eventually calmed down but never quite disappeared. 

More than once, I slid into friends on both level and uneven terrain, was obliged to apologize and straightened my pace but I almost succeeded in knocking some of them off their own feet. People who’ve never had vertigo have no idea what an unbalanced plane the victim suffers; how equilibrium swings around like an out-of-control pendulum; what getting out of bed or rising from a seated position entails.

I’m not sure if all vertigos can be cured as mine was, but I know there are a lot of people who have never even heard of the Epley Maneuver and neither have their doctors. I was lucky that my physician, Dr. Vanessa Feliciano, on the staff of UW Medicine, sent me to the UW Medical Center Physical Therapy. She was convinced I could be helped, even though I was sure it was hopeless.

When I arrived, I was confronted by a waiting room full of people who were clearly disabled with canes, walkers, wheelchairs. I thought perhaps there was something wrong with my neck and/or spine, so maybe I was in the right place. I met with a physical therapist, Emmanuel Craig. As we chatted, we discovered we had friends in common and I relaxed and allowed him to manipulate my head and neck. I've never been comfortable having people fiddle with my neck.

When Emmanuel told me it was clear I was suffering from vertigo, I told him I knew that! but then he explained BPPV to me (benign paroxysmal positional vertigo). BPPV is the [sudden sensation that you’re spinning or that the inside of your head is spinning.] I had a severe case. Surprise, surprise. What he told me next promised to change my life. It could be cured, simply and within moments.

I walked out of the UWMC PT, clearheaded and balanced. I was also astounded. That this treatment could be so uncomplicated, involve no drugs and leave absolutely no after effects, amazed me. I tried to share the information with others who I knew suffered from vertigo but was met with disbelief (I could relate) and skepticism. I told them to ask their doctor and make an appointment with a physical therapist.

I am well now. I know how to resolve my vertigo if it returns, and it may. I no longer need to fear falling and running into people, furniture, small children, etc. I don’t have to cling to walls. I get out of bed in the morning and sit up normally, ready for my cup of coffee, not afraid I will vomit it up.

If you have vertigo and you want to try curing yourself, you can follow the instructions in this video, which is what I will do, if mine returns. Have someone with you to help guide you along. It won’t hurt, isn’t complicated and can change your life. Good luck.

Thanks for reading.

Postcard Poetry Fest 2015

Here are the saved poems from the Postcard Poetry Fest I participated in the month of August. There are, undoubtedly, common threads running through these days and reflect what was going on in my life and surroundings.

The goal of the PoPoFest is to write and send one postcard a day during the month; and the focus is to write about what is going on in one’s life or a reflection of the postcard or any damn thing you want to write. It’s a fun exercise and those of us who participated this year (over 400) have Paul Nelson to thank for his efforts and support. I’ve included some photos of postcards I sent, since the large collage is the ones I received.

(Unfortunately, two of my postcards got sent without my having saved them. Next year I won’t rely on modern technology and will copy each one.)

1

I thought of you

Or people like you

For days on end

When the wisps of smoke

Burned our eyes just a little

Or made our throats scratchy

I prayed for you though I don’t trust prayers, people who pray

If so, we brought further disasters of different kinds.

I saw the evidence today

I hope you’re safe and suffered no loss

I prayed for you though I don’t believe in prayer or take stock in those who pray.

2

We never really understood what it was like to be cold

To understand terms like bone chilling or teeth chattering

The shock was like electric

Like a big slap in the face

And yet we survived and begged to do it all over again.

Glaciers in the middle of summer.

Thrill seeking insanity.

3

The ocean of my past visits my dreams

Bringing characters I’ve known,

met,

loved and hated.

Ghosts who caress and soothe,

jab and jabber,

poke and plunder.

I wake most mornings hanging onto images that sometimes haunt me throughout the day.

Until night when a new wave washes in.

Sent to Arthur Tulee

4

I took you everywhere on my bicycle.

Sometimes Mary Lou would come with us on her horse.

Mom said “you have a baby now” and I know she thought you might convince me

to have none of my own. It was a chance she was willing to take.

She never regretted anything.

Sent to Ashley Sage

5

I don’t want to be Lucia Berlin,

Buried in the back shelf of literary history,

Late in life success and little renown

And yet

I would give anything to be Lucia Berlin

Even if buried in the back shelf

Discovered as some old dottering typist

Pounding away.

Sent to Chrissy Burd

6

I wonder if my grandma sent us back to our mother with disguised relief.

We were forced to be indoor and outdoor visitors.

Sit up to the table bus our dishes use napkins and welcome mats.

I, too, enforce the rules with my little guests.

Giving in to electronics, at times…

I miss them when they go but

I kiss them goodbye with a limp

but sincere sigh of relief.

Sent to Margaret Santhanam

7

I don’t want to fight

Have no talent for it

Never practice and best at walking. Away.

I only want to embrace you

Tell you how much you are loved

And ask if you remember any of the good stuff

I don’t want to fight.

Sent to Libby Maxey

8

This isn’t my lifetime

I’m just learning now

I have some other lessons to learn before I’m done here

I want to move on but I don’t think I’ll be able to.

I’ll have to come back and do some things over again.

I wanted to be a cheerleader in high school

Now I realize how unimportant that was

And glad it never happened.

Sent to Judy Kleinburg

9

I grew up with skin privilege

I knew it because my father knew it and he told me so.

“You’re lucky you’re white.”

He told me to never look down on another human being because of their difference.

Short, fat, skinny,

Woman who wants to be a man,

Man who wants to be a woman.

We’re all equal.

Same color blood.

He said.

Sent to Judy Mayhew

10

Today I thought about our words exchanged yesterday.

Words

is all they are.

There is no feeling, emotion, warmth

When two people tap letters into a phone

And send it across a distance.

I left a phone message but you claimed you didn’t get it.

I can’t prove that since it’s not “saved.”

I wish you’d talk to me.

Love, Mom

Sent to Theresa Pappas

11

The fires are eating us

Coming slowly like a death march

over hill

over mountain

over tree and stream.

My daddy said it was the fire that would take us.

Landslides and mountains tumbling down and then

Fires.

He was always right about these things.

If he’s watching he’ll be nodding and grieving for the trees.

Sent to Marge Merrill

12

The last time we were together

We all smiled

Looked into the camera and pretended things weren’t prickly

We spoke with friends and family and fooled them all.

“What a nice relationship you have with your brothers,” it was said.

Like drinking vinegar, gulps and snorts.

We weren’t brought up to lie but

we’re very good at it.

Sent to Lynne Shapiro

13

She was my sister.

From different mothers.

And fathers.

They say “soul sisters.”

I never had one…a sister.

I was surrounded by brothers.

And hand-me-down overalls and t-shirts.

Cap guns and under-the-bed farts.

I wanted a sister and when I finally got one,

She flew.

Sent to Linda Crosfield

14

Today was a stormy, sunny, mad-cap day!

It was the kind of day to wear your grandmother hat and bake in the kitchen

Cakes from scratch and scones

And flip blueberry pancakes and

Fill the hummingbird feeders

And THEN…

It all got hot and sticky and humid

And we tore our clothes off with Wild Abandon

And JUMPED in the lake! J

15

I stepped outside to see if I could see

The meteor shower,

So dark but no stars in the sky.

A jet came from the north.

A big one.

The big ones come in slow and low.

They take their time floating down through space.

They come from where one can see the stars.

Up close but far away.

16

My friend died yesterday.

She “took her own life.”

What an odd expression.

To take a life.

Like stealing.

A grand theft robbery.

And that expression too:

“Stealing away in the night.”

I suppose it was somewhat criminal what she did.

She’s gone.

She’s left us empty handed.

We feel “taken” as in “fooled.”

She fooled us into thinking everything was okay.

Just fine.

Okey dokey.

We were robbed.

17

“Let a smile be your umbrella,” he said.

“I can fix it so,

make it a better day for you. Be it

Storm or sunny weather.”

I knew it would be okay

As things always end up being.

But a broken umbrella is such an annoyance

And I could not

For the moment,

See beyond the snags and shatters.

Sent to Kellyanne Pearce

18

Where will you be at Christmastime?

My family wants me with them

And I love my family

But oh… the unhappiness -

I was once “Mother Christmas,” and

You never saw a home so decorated, inside and out.

With every day the baking and all the heavenly preparation.

But our angels flew away one day and now I go to palm trees and beaches

And Christmas is for giving to the needy, not the ungrateful.

Sent to Rosanne Braslow

19

Our girl.

She flew.

Like an angel, she went her way.

I held her, didn’t want to ever let her go.

Her stinky little breath, the last ones and then

Gone.

Peace.

No more pain.

The struggle to keep on keeping on.

That’s down now.

How quick a little life can go and all the joy over.

Oh, we loved her so.

Azula (Zuzu) Rome Oct 22, 2001 – Aug 3, 2015

Sent to Sue Anne Brannan Walker

20

What if you knew her?

What if she sailed away and you didn’t get your chance to say “goodbye,

My friend, my sister, my girl, my lovely girl?”

What then?

And you followed the waves, the hand waves and the ocean waves

But there was never a port.

What then?

Sent to Susan Watson

21

I wanted to tell you about the silly women in high heels

And how they tottered

(Yes, they tottered!)

On the uneven streets and I wondered

“Who will catch them if they fall?”

But they are the steady ones

Those women

They are the ones who will lead the way.

Sent to Anthony Kolasny

22

I want to share this with you.

This time from far away and long ago.

How brilliant to remember

To remember the little things

The feel of my shoulder leaning into yours

The song we heard that morning at breakfast after we made the bed

Peering at each other over a continent of sheets and pillows.

Sent to Kristin Williams

23

My uncle’s name was Roy.

My father’s brother.

They were born in 1903 and 1905,

Respectively

and moved from Missouri

when they were little boys

to live with their grandmother in Montana.

They moved from the West to the Way-Out-West.

They were Indians and cowboys, my father and his brother.

They were American originals.

They were real pioneers.

Sent to Gillian Standley

24

Did you ever think what does it mean to be of the “working class?”

How does a “working class” exist if there is no work?

Find a piece of cardboard, write your own legend and

Stake yourself out by the freeway,

Never expecting a ride;

Just a little bit of class.

Sent to Terry Holzman

25

I’m going to Mt Everest tonight

In my book

I’ve been to Africa, Nepal,

Slogged through the mud in Tibet.

I have feared for my life and saved that of others.

I’ve died in childbirth and fought in wars.

All from my pillow.

For the love of books.

Sent to Amanda Adams

26

Montana

My daddy was raised in Montana.

Said he raised some hell there.

Was afraid of snakes his whole life

And things that moved across the earth without feet.

That would include fire, which scared him more than rattlers.

He was familiar with the tongues of deepest fears

And managed to practice humility while considering

Profound courage.

Sent to Carole Slesnick

                              

27

Did you hear my song?
It was a book I wrote

I poured out my heart

Like red wine from a broken bottle

About all the loves I lost

First with My Boy

The only one who tore me up and down my middle

All the way to the last one who flew away………..

Sent to Paul Nelson

28

It’s another Saturday

It was just Saturday so recently

So how can it again be Saturday?

How can all these hairs on my head be gray?

How can my chin droop in this way?

I blame it all on all these Saturdays.

Sent to Bev Fesharaki

29

It came. It came upon that morning

And you can remember her

Blowing kisses at you

As she stood high above the sea

You, on the wooden planked dock

The scent of creosote so strong you could have

eaten it for breakfast.

It came and it brought her to you.

Send to Nicholas Kolasny

Thank you for reading.....

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Tonight I Think About Tomorrow

Tonight I think about tomorrow. 

Fourteen years ago.

We went to bed innocent and woke up completely startled. 

Furniture and dogs were kicked. 

Implacable disbelief. 

Merciless reality. 

Overturned lives, loves, plans, convictions.

Our world changed. 

We began to think and feel as others have for centuries. 

Fear. 

Anger. 

Distrust.

In fourteen years I have heard about conspiracy, lack of evidence, missing recordings and documents.

One thing remains. Loss. We are stuck with that.

Loss of freedom, confidence, loved ones, futures.

What have we learned?

Little to nothing.

The fighters continue to fight in the wrong arenas. The radicals continue to terrorize and strike where the desert is no longer about camels or oil or negotiations. 

The vital organs cling to reason, wisdom, compassion, with heads in the clouds 

and argue about camels, 

arenas 

and 

fighters.

Tonight I think about tomorrow. 

Fourteen years ago.

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Thank you for reading.

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