The Open Matt Project

Snuffed Out

Monday. Next Monday is my appointment, to be exact. It seems hearing exams are all the rage this week and I won't be able to kill that hour until next week. No matter, presumably it won't be any worse than last week.

It started two weeks ago. Just a spot of lightheaded dizziness. I figured as usual it was dehydration or low blood-sugar. Not so, however, as it persisted for the entire day. The next day was the same, then the rest of the week. My world on wheels, rolling and pitching, suddenly became a lot less trustworthy. Maybe it was nutrition, or something I ate, or possibly the bug I thought flew in my ear years ago; I went through as many theories as time and energy allowed.

Last week the burden of conjecture was lifted from me. New layers of affliction had arrived, namely disorientation, memory-loss, and my old friend hallucinations. I lost my ability to think, to imagine, and so to communicate. I couldn't feel or sympathize, reason or remember. Late in the week I found words to describe how it felt. It felt like I was being snuffed out. Like a cup over a candle, my world was being slowly dimmed and silenced. It was, and is, like dying.

There was a test I could use, to see whether or not I was getting better or worse. I'd think about Denali and see if anything happened. I never thought it would be possible, but even she (like everything else) has become a ghost in amber, unreachable for thought or feeling. My perspective has shrunk to what is immediately in front of me. My world is within a stones throw now, and although I remember some of what it was like before the last two weeks, I am losing that as I write this.

So I saw a doctor this morning. He, like most people, thought it might be stress. I'm only going to say it once, here, and not mention it again. It's not stress. He looked in my ears, said it was all clear and clean there. My blood pressure and temperature were taken - perfectly normal there as well. It seemed like maybe an MRI would be useful, but expensive. No health insurance = very expensive for me. And so, referral to an ear specialist for a hearing exam - seven days from now.

If seven days was enough time to make the world, I wonder if it's enough time for me to lose it?