I puked last night. I spent today nauseous. Zofran – I love Zofran. It + ginger + fresh air breaks got me through birthday brunch. It’s good to have gotten out. My birthday was feeling like a bit of a bust. I had to remind myself last night that this is just what my body is like now, that there’s no reason to think my birthday would be any different, so there’s no point feeling ripped off on account of feeling crappy yesterday or today.
Since the EEG, I’ve been considering why the hyperventilation condition brought the same sensations as when I feel really, really bad. I.e., the buzzing, thudding, swaying, graying vision awfulness. And here’s a thought: Maybe I’m just hyperventilating when I feel those sensations, I mean when I feel them outside of intentionally hyperventilating for an EEG. That’s the simplest explanation, right?
I started to feel the tingling this afternoon and I asked the people with me “I need an honest answer here. Does it seem to either of you that I am breathing oddly?” My husband asked “right now?” I said “now and for about the last 20 minutes.” My friend, who is a speech therapist (works in a B.A.T.H. with lots of TBI and stroke patients) and my husband both said no. Total, that’s two “no”s, three if you count my own. But I am not convinced. Maybe I am “over breathing” very subtly. How does one measure that? No, really, that’s not a rhetorical question. I’m going to ask about this at the follow up neuro appointment.
It would be a nice explanation. Not easy to adjust necessarily, not if I am lacking awareness of doing it, but something that is relatively innocuous. And presumably I could do something to try to become more aware of it and then stop doing it. Wouldn’t that be nice?