What is BPPV, you ask? CNN's Health Library says:
| Benign paroxysmal positional vertigo (BPPV). BPPV involves intense, brief episodes of vertigo associated with a change in the position of your head, often when you turn over in bed or sit up in the morning. It occurs when normal calcium carbonate crystals (otoconia) break loose and fall into the wrong part of the canals in your inner ear. When these particles shift, they stimulate sensors in your ear, producing an episode of vertigo. Doctors don't know what causes BPPV, but it may be a natural result of aging. Trauma to your head also may lead to BPPV. |
Since I have had no head trauma that I am aware of, it is a result of aging. AGING. Gah!
I am not happy about this.
On the up side, my friend and co-worker Janice has had this for years and lives a perfectly normal life. She just has to remember not to sleep on her right side or she will wake up sea sick. The trick, she says, is NOT to avoid the spinning completely. Like an ice skater trained to spin and not fall down, you have to train your body to resist the temptation to fall down or throw up.
Fun.
Your body will automatically compensate to avoid the Very Bad Thing, she says, but if you let it do that, you will never learn to tolerate it.
Sounds so easy. Like skiing. Skiing sounded easy before I tried it. And yoga. Yoga still looks easy to me. Then I get down on the floor and discover the human body is not naturally bendy. And THEN, I roll over from my back to my stomach and start to spin spin spin! Woo! And before you ask, no, I do not roll over quickly. I roll over ever so gently and slowly since the first time it happened. There is a short delay where I think I am safe and then, WHEEEEEEEE, the ride begins.
I am whining. I recognize this. My leetle episodes are quite brief: less than ten seconds each. And I have only had about, oh, I don't know...more than five, less than ten.
It just freaks me out when my body does something new and disturbing and the only answers are:
- No one knows why it happens, and
- There is no treatment.
Did I say 'Gah'?
P.S. Saturday office hours have begun. No clients today but I know they are out there. Waiting. Watching. (Hold me.)
