The Last Three Days....

have been a little rough.

I spent Tuesday and Wednesday at the Mayo, again. This time I met with an epilepsy specialist named Dr. Cascino. He was really super nice, and seemed way more concerned and interested in my well-being than Kantarci ever did. However, he talked at a million miles a minute and sometimes it was kinda hard to keep up. On the plus side, he has three goals for me: be seizure free, be on meds that I am side-effect free, and be able to safely and legally do anything anyone else my age can do (like drive). YAY FOR AWESOME GOALS! On the minus side, he's really concerned about the lightheaded spells or simple-partial seizures I've been having, and is deeply worried about the fact that I have them every day, several times a day. This worries me, because I have grown used to them and had almost brushed them off as a minor inconvenience, but if they really are seizures... it just gets a little scary again. On the neutral side, because it's helpful but inconvenient, I get to spend another 3 days in the hospital. December 14th I check into Saint Mary's, get my head all wired up, sit in a bed, eat hospital food, and be video-monitored 24/7 for 2-3 days. Greattttt. So I have that to worry about, and mostly, trying to get all my school stuff for the semester done before all that happens. Yay for stresss! (note the sarcasm).

So that was Tuesday and Wednesday. Wednesday night Shawn and I drove out to Paynesville to spend time with my family for thanksgiving. 'Twas uneventful. We ate and spent the afternoon yesterday with his family, and that was entertaining. Shawn thought it would be funny to slam the cool-whip lid into my face, so I smeared his with snicker-salad. It was enjoyable. Shawn's Grandma prayed for me and got all teary-eyed, which was sweeet but very awkward. Shawn made Kelsey cry by insulting her boyfriend. We watched Up, and I took a nap. Shawn and Josh wrestled and got in some brotherly bonding time. It was a good thanksgiving. We went back to my parents' house and watched Shawn's Star Trek movie on the big screen TV. Then we drove home...

When we got home it was almost 10, and knowing that Turbo's light switches off a little after 9, I went to go check on him and give him some food. His light was off, his temperature was stable, everything appeared as it should have, but his little body was unresponsive. We hope that he died in his sleep- he was curled up in his bag like he always does when he's sleeping. And of course, we hope he died painlessly. RIP Turbo, we'll miss you.

So that royally sucked. Today is black friday and I have to work, of course, as does Shawn. The thing is, Shawn is working this morning, and I don't work until night. We're hoping there will be enough time in between that we cann take Turbo's body to the vet and have him properly taken care of. I'm still crying.

In short- my health problems aren't getting better. Thanksgiving was decent. Turbo died :( and I'm super-stressed with work and school before I have to go back into the hospital. It's been a rough 3-4 days.

Stress

Ugh, so it's getting to that time of year when the stress is piling up. I have 3 major papers, and presentations to accompany them, none of which have adequate theses, and all of which need massive revisions.

I am tired, I am working a lot, and after thanksgiving our hours at work will be extended to midnight.

I have 2 days of Mayo appointments next week, and I'm worried about those. What if something is seriously wrong with me? Oh, and I found out that Paula, my advisor and prof of 2 of my classes this semester, has also had seizures and is on meds. It would have been nice to know this sooner, have someone who understands. Ugh. Whatever.

Although logically speaking, I have lots of time to do my work, I feel like I don't, and just thinking about it stresses me out more, which doesn't help, because when I'm stressed I get even less actually accomplished. In fact, I have a tendency to sleep a lot more.

Shawn told me to relax today, try to get some thought in about stuff without actually working, and it's helping. I'm actually talking to Dugan about my atheism paper and it's going really well and helping a lot. I just need to learn to relax.

I am going to be able to relax, right? I'm not going to go insane? Right?!

Miscellaneous Updates

1) I had another seizure. November 3rd. I can't be 100% sure, because Shawn was already gone to class for the day. I woke up and had a terrible headache and nausea, got up to pee, was super tired, and went back to bed for another hour. When I got up the second time, I showered and brushed my teeth like I normally do, and while brushing my teeth I realized that my bottom lip was swollen and puffy and looked like I had bitten it. I had been wearing my retainer so it wasn't nearly as bad as the damage my tongue took last time, in fact, most of the puffiness was gone by the end of the day.

Anyway, I called Kantarci and he set up an appointment with one of his colleagues that deals specifically with epilepsy, so for the two days before Thanksgiving I have another MRI, EEG and doctor's appointment in Rochester. Wish me luck.

2) I turned 21!!!! Yay!!! Got a bunch of gift cards, Mom and Knoll came to town and took me shopping and out for lunch, and I hung out with Nina and my new friend Laura and Laura's boyfriend Bob. It was fun. I got drunk, but not exceptionally so, and I was fine the next morning (both hangover-wise and seizure-wise). So yah, I have officially surpassed one of the last major legal hurdles. 16 was driving, 18 was voting and a bunch of other stuff, 21 was drinking. I'M A BIG KID NOW! :)

3) I'm pluggin away at school. Slowly but surely getting through the semester. It's tough, and I'm quickly running out of steam. I have 2 of my major papers mostly done, I plan on working on one this weekend, and I will have a major presentation based on those papers for each of my classes. Slowly but surely... can't give up... damn some days motivation is hard to come by.

Memory Issues Revisited

I realize today that I have a lot of issues. I have anxiety issues, I have memory issues, I have anxiety issues because of memory issues. I have lots of stress. I'm not the most social person in the world. I have some issues I need to work on.

I've been having more lightheaded spells lately. I refuse to call them seizures, even though I'm fairly confident that's what they are. They're not just on the left side of my body anymore, they now alternate between right and left. I still have some measure of control over them, but stress definitely aggravates it. Shawn thinks I need to go to the doctor again, just to check on things. Personally, I'm sick of doctors.

Today in my Buddhism class we were meditating, and the prof asked us all what we were feeling. A lot of people replied with "calm" "clear" "focused" etc... but in almost 20 minutes of meditation, I spent at least the first half feeling scared or anxious. Why does being alone with my thoughts terrify me? Why am I so afraid of everything?

We got to talking, in class, about what a person is. Philosophically speaking, of course. Some people thought that the self was contained within a soul, others in personality, some in thoughts, some thought the self was represented through actions... I think the self is made of memory, but no one who hasn't been there could understand what it's like to lose that. It really got me thinking, who am I? Who was I? Am I different now than I was a year ago?

I've decided I want to write a book. I think I'll title it "Out of the Void" with some sort of catchy subtitle (maybe "a year gained after a year lost") about my experiences with amnesia, epilepsy, and a lot of the things I've put into this blog in the last year. My biggest hurdle will be not turning it into a diary, not exposing my entire life, because, as we can see here, I have issues with overexposure. I'm glad no one reads this, because I don't need the world knowing that in the last year I've lost my memory, had major relationship issues with my fiance, had a falling out with my best friend, lost my driver's licence, etc etc etc. I mean, some of those things are public knowledge, but if I decide to follow through with this book idea, a lot will have to be edited out.

Long story short, I thought I was getting over this whole memory thing. I thought I was getting better, but I still have a lot of stuff to work on, and I think it's going to take me a lot longer than I expected to fully accept things and move on.

Buddhist Temple Visit

Saturday morning we went to the Buddhist Temple about 45 minutes away and fed the hungry ghosts. It was incredible, and knowing I'd been there before but not remembering is so surreal. I got up at 3:30, we left school at 4, and got there by 5. The monks did about an hour of chanting, both to the Buddha and then as part of the ceremony for ancestral spirits, and to call to any spirits that may have been reborn as hungry ghosts. Hungry Ghosts are these ghosts who are ugly and putrid and disgusting and they have huge bellies but tiny tiny mouths so they are always hungry, and they can only see things that are gross and dirty, so in order to feed them we had to throw sticky rice and fruit onto the ground. The whole purpose of the ceremony is to make merit for yourself and your family in terms of karma, as well as to honor your ancestors just in case they did something bad and were reborn as hungry ghosts. The temple was beautiful, and I had a really good time going.

Made Me Think

Have you ever been to the website makesmethink.com ? I love that site. It's all about different stories (most of them sad, sweet, or bittersweet) that affect a person and make them think. I had one of these moments yesterday, but it was a bit too long to submit to the website, so I'll post it here instead.

Yesterday, I went to school at the University of Minnesota with Shawn. He wanted me to, and we killed almost 3 hours between his classes. But when he went to class, I wandered around looking for something to do.
There was a preacher on campus. A man who wore a big sandwichboard saying that everyone is going to hell and with a big list of people who qualify as sinners on the front (fornicators, drunkards, pot smokers, gangster rappers, feminists, socialists, dirty dancers, homosexuals... the list goes on). He was dressed nicely in a shirt and tie, a cute little vest and khaki pants, and he was just standing in the middle of the courtyard, shouting for all to hear, stories and moral lessons. Naturally, considering we're on a college campus of over 50,000 students, a crowd formed, and many people shouted back. People would antagonize him, and ask him questions, and try to disprove him when he cited some scripture as evidence for his beliefs, but he did quite well under all the pressure.

There's another crazy preacher guy, who is apparently a regular on campus, but who might genuinely be crazy. He was wearing a big purple hat and usually just stands around reading the bible out loud, but today he decided that since other preacher was getting more attention, he would join in. Mostly he just wandered around throwing a football at kids and playing his guitar, but occasionally he would sarcastically mock the other preacher. Again, the first preacher dealt with this remarkably well.

Eventually these two were joined by a student (who I had seen earlier representing the atheist club on campus) wearing a sandwichboard that said "Smile, there is no hell" and just standing there quietly smiling. The entire time I was there watching, for over an hour, he just stood there quietly smiling. I respect that action more than anyone on the sidelines who was shouting, because he never said a word.

Then came the part that made me think, and made me very, very angry. Three students came running out from a building behind me, each with a can of silly string. They sprayed silly string all over the preacher, and ran off the other direction. He pulled up his board over his head to cover his face, and for a split second, I could see fear in his eyes. I mean really, how was he to know that what they were spraying all over him was silly string, and not pepper spray, or mace, or spraypaint, or who knows what else. It just made me wonder, how many times has he been attacked for his public preaching? How many times before has he pulled his board over his head in self-defense?

Yet he continued preaching. He and the crazy guy picked off as much of the silly string as possible, and he just kept going, as if nothing had even happened. It made me think, why is he doing this? Why would anyone put themselves in a position not only of ridicule, but possibly even danger, to preach the bible to a bunch of college kids? What motivates him? What does he think he's accomplishing? What gratification does he get from it? And the biggest question of all... how far would this man go to spread the word of God before enough is enough? How many times would he be willing to be ridiculed, humiliated, and even attacked? How serious would things have to get for him to stop doing it?

And maybe it's just because I'm taking a martyrdom class, but I had a couple more questions. Would he stop? Or would this man, and many others, be willing to give up their lives should the situation come down to it? And separately, the definition of martyrdom involves dying for a cause, but can a person be a martyr before death? What if death is not a requirement, but instead, a certain amount of suffering? Can a living person, willingly suffering for a cause, be considered a martyr?

These are questions I don't have the answer to, and may go much deeper than a situation of a preacher on a college campus, but the whole point is that it made me think, and I hope it makes other people think too.

And a note to anyone who thinks it's funny to attack another person, even with silly string... It's not funny. It's rude and just plain stupid. Have a little respect. I disagree with the guy as much as anyone else: I'm pretty much an atheist, I'm a feminist, I support gay rights, I drink, and I have premarital sex; but that doesn't mean I'm going to insult or attack someone who has the courage to get up in front of a crowd and talk about his beliefs. By publicly humiliating another human being, you're not being funny, you're making yourself look like an ass, probably because you are one.

Through the Maze

I'm not really sure what I'm going to write about today. In the past, many of my blog entries have had a specific topic or theme, whereas today, I am merely feeling conversational or informative. So in no particular fashion, I shall let you, my reader, follow my train of thoughts through the maze. Sometimes we shall hit dead ends, or end up back where we began. Whether we will ever emerge, I have no idea.

I think I might be in over my head with schoolwork. I signed up for a full load of classes, but I think I have to drop my history class. I don't need it to graduate, and without it, I think I'd be much saner. Even without it I'm writing 3 papers a week, doing a ton of reading, working on several larger projects (it seems all of my professors decided to space out the final project over the entire semester, which is both good and bad), and trying to keep up with my job, my fiance, and my friends. Oh, and Martial Arts Club will be starting soon.

Part of me still has major anxiety issues. Because I feel overwhelmed with school, I get anxious or depressed. I start losing my optimism and only seeing the negative. I sometimes give myself mild panic-attacks and have to remember to breathe. I cry for no reason. Needless to say, I need to learn how to cope. All of this after only 2 days of classes is not a good start to the semester, but I'm hoping that as my options are limited (learn to deal with it or go insane) that I will be able to get a better grasp on the situation as time progresses.

Nina is probably leaving after this semester. She's going back to Wisconsin. She wants to get into a music program at the University in Madison. She misses her friends from high school and her family. I can't really blame her for wanting to go, but the selfish part of me wants to know what's going to happen to me when she's gone. She's pretty much my only friend. Who I am going to hang out with? My other friends are limited friends- I only hang out with them on certain occasions or under certain circumstances. Nina... nina I can call anytime for no reason whatsoever. I will miss her if she goes.

I saw a play today. It was called 'My Name is Rachel Corrie', and it's about a young woman who died in the middle east while working as a peace activist. The play itself was a series of monologs- excerpts from her diary entries, etc- but parts of it really got to me. She kept asking how the world could be so awful, and how people who are privileged can really be so blind to the suffering of others. One of the quotes was "I was embarrassed at just how long it took me to understand, deep in my gut, that people LIVE like this" (in reference to poverty and war-zone activity). Other parts of it spoke to me in different ways, and I definitely could identify with the main character. She went to small liberal arts college, always felt like a bit of an outsider from her middle-class suburban family, fell in love with the world around her, and never quite felt satisfied. She was always looking for something worthwhile, and didn't find it until she journeyed to Israel. Once she found it, she died for it.

It might be selfish of me to think of this martyrdom story and somehow figure out a way to tie it into my issues pertaining to epilepsy, but that's where my thoughts went, and as I mentioned previously, I'm not holding anything back; into the maze we go. She said she didn't understand how people could live their lives and not understand another person's perspective. She didn't understand how the world could go on as it did, blind to the trials and suffering of so many. She felt isolated from her family and friends, not being able to explain her feelings about the sights and experiences that surrounded her every day.
I don't understand how people with epilepsy can have multiple seizures a day. I can't imagine it. It's so foreign to me, trying to think that I've had 2 in the last 2 months, and that's a big deal. I can't even fathom dealing with it every day. And I know, the world is not blind to the suffering of people with illnesses, but if there is anything I have learned, it is that when the rest of the world moves on and confronts the next big thing, those who are directly affected will never be the same, and can never look at anything the same way again. I am ok with most of the world being blind to epilepsy and my issues- it's really not that huge of a deal, and I understand that- but it has become such a huge part of my life and my thoughts, that I can't imagine trying to go back to a world where I don't have to wear my retainer to bed as protection against biting my tongue off.

The part of the play that struck closest to home though was the isolation aspect. The fact that no matter how hard she tried, no matter what anyone said, no matter what her counter-arguments were, she could not make people understand. She tried to tell her mother about her experiences living with Palestinians and how horrible their living conditions were, and her views of the political atmosphere. The truth is, there is no way her mother could understand without being there too. I try to tell my family what it is like to have no memory of 2008. I try to tell them how scary it is to get lightheaded, or to wake up having bitten my tongue. I try to tell them that there is absolutely no logical reason for the irrational fear that sometimes grips me so hard that I can barely breathe. They nod and hug me and pretend to get it, but at the end of the day, they still ask me what's wrong, and what's scary. They don't get it. It's like being split in half every time it happens. I have a logical part of me that says "it's ok, this happens all the time, there is NOTHING to be afraid of" but when most people can let logic overrule their fear, I can't. Something is electro-chemically altered in my head that even though I recognize the logical argument, I am not capable of not be terrified.

Sometimes, I hear voices. I don't think I've ever told anyone that part. Sometimes, when I'm talking, the world slows down, and I can't finish my sentence. I don't recognize the words coming out of my mouth. I can hear the things people are saying, but the information doesn't sink in. I can repeat what they say, but cannot comprehend it if an answer is needed. Subtle sounds in the background suddenly fill my head. I feel like I'm underwater, and everything is muffled. And sometimes, just sometimes, I hear voices. Not crazy voices; usually very random voices, like excerpts from a television show or movie, or a part of a conversation I heard earlier that day. I'm afraid to tell people I hear voices, because then people might think I've truly gone insane. Who knows, maybe I have.

But my whole point is, how is it possible to make anyone understand what it's like to be me? I've given up hope on actually getting anywhere. Instead, I just sit here and blog away. No one reads this anyway, but it helps to get everything out in the open. I would write in my diary, but typing is faster, and even though I know no one reads this, I secretly hope that someone will. Maybe, if I keep trying long enough, maybe if I keep talking to everyone and no one, just maybe, someone will hear, and just maybe, someone out there can begin to understand.