Today’s been rough.

Julian and I needed to go back to the sports rehab center where I had gone to have impressions of my feet made in order to pick up the resulting shoes.

The trip there was uneventful. I felt fine at that point. No warning signs.

But as soon as I got out of the car, I started feeling dizzy. And I felt dizzy all the way through the lobby and down the elevator as well.

But it wasn’t too severe. I felt unsteady on my pegs but not terribly so. So I just proceeded as normal, not giving it much thought as I went into the little where the nice British lady^[1] talked to me and showed me the shoes (which are ginormous, I feel like Frankenstein in them) and had me put them on and walk around a bit to see how they were fitting and so on.

After that, it was time to go back to the reception area to make my next appointment (Jan 22 at 1 pm) and this time, when I got up, I got REALLY dizzy.

This culminated in me taking a spill in the reception area. Luckily, my right arm absorbed most of the impact, thus sparing my head.

And let me tell you, if I had to fall, I sure as heck picked a great place to do it, because within minutes I had a doctor, a nurse clinician, a physiotherapist, and Jackie hovering over me concernedly.

I wish I remembered the doctor’s name. She was awesome. Very cheerful, gentle, and sweet. She asked me the expected questions about when I started feeling dizzy, had I eaten breakfast, what meds I was on, and so on.

Thanks to blister packing, I no longer know what meds I am on. I used to know them all by heart because I saw and read the pill bottles twice a day when I medicated.

But now, IDK WTF. Check my file.

I seem to be uninjured apart from my arm being a little sore. Once the nice ladies had checked me over and taken my vitals, I was able to sit up and then stand up long enough to get into the wheelchair one of them brought out.

So I got wheeled up to the lobby and waited for Julian there. The nice ladies stayed with me until I had gotten into the car OK.

All the way home, I felt ill. A little nauseous, dizzy, aching at the base of my testicles, head lightly throbbing.

The trip from the car to the apartment was fraught with peril. I was beyond dizzy. I was in such a messed up state that none of my usual environs – the car, the parking structure, the hallways, the door – looked or felt familiar.

Instead they seemed like something from a deliberately alienating art house film. Like things were shot from weird angles and through a fisheye lens.

Luckily I was able to get to the couch in the living room and then into my room and my beloved computer chair, and hence I could start blogging to you wonderful folk.

What happened? Well my new shoes have to take part of the blame. Jackie warned me that because I have not experienced arch support for almost a decade that there are likely muscles in my legs and feet that have atrophied over time and that might complicate matters somewhat.

Yeah, no shit. I just had to take my new clodhoppers off because they were starting to hurt my feet when I was just sitting here without putting any weight on them.

I am starting to think that whatever fucked up my arms and legs has done enough damage to my foot tendons that those big shoes of mine will not work for me.

That would be a shame. I rather liked having arch support for once.

Clearly I am going to need to call Jackie and tell her about all this. And that’s fine.

But I don’t know what made me so dizzy. I felt the dizziness again when I got up and used the bathroom just now, but thankfully at a far less severe level.

It could be a blood circulation issue caused by the shoes. We will see if things go back to normal when the shoes have been off for a while.

I’d hate to have to go to the ER for vertigo.

More after the break.

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As mysteriously as…

Well I just got my supper cooked and ready without being too dizzy, so I guess this is going to be yet another mysterious ailment that comes and goes with no explanation as to why it’s happening leaving me wondering WTF.

Oh well. I guess taking a nap helped a lot. I still don’t feel one hundred percent good – for one, I’m still a little dizzy – but I guess I am mostly back to my more traditional levels of pain and misery.

It’s like coming home again!

Still don’t have the shoes on. I will try them again soon. They felt quite comfortable when I first wore them, and my GOD did it feel good to have arch support again.

So I am really hoping the issues are fixable. I get the feeling that because medical science abandoned all attempts to find out what the fuck is wrong with my legs (and arms), nobody knows how the ortho shoes will interact with the damage and that’s how we ended up in this sorry state of affairs.

I imagine I will have to go back to the sport rehab place for more measurements and adjustments and whatnot. And a lot sooner than January.

Le sigh. Oh well. Welcome to getting old. Everything starts to break down.

Especially for a medical mystery like me. I’ll be six feet under and some schmuck doctor will still be saying, “Well our tests show you to be perfectly healthy, Mister Bertrand. ”

Not that I’m bitter.

I will talk to you nice people again tomorrow.