Wednesday, March 25, 2009

Blinded by the light

This morning I started to feel a little sick a few minutes into my shuttle ride to work. I got seriously nauseated, and then I started sweating. Profusely. I got pins and needles all over my body, and started seeing spots. This was all in the course of a couple of minutes.

AND THEN I WENT BLIND.

I had closed my eyes because of the nausea and the bright spots, and when I opened them again, I couldn't see anything. Dark. Black. I actually touched my eyeballs with my fingers just to prove to myself that they were actually open. They were.

So I silently flipped my shit. Terry Gross was yacking in my earphones, I was sweating in actual streams - seriously, I soaked through my clothes and made puddles in my boots - and tried to figure out at what point I should get the attention of the girl next to me and tell her that I could see absolutely nothing at all. It was absolutely terrifying. 

I was too panicked to get real about what being blind would mean, but I did have time to figure out that I'd lose my job, Mike would probably not dump me, and I really did not know if I wanted to live without my sight. That might seem silly now, but I was really in the shit, man. It was bleak.

And then...after ten minutes (a loooong ten minutes), it came back. It was kind of like a Magic Eye poster, where the blackness resolved itself into light and dark spots, then fuzzy shapes, then good old regular-type sight. The sweating and the nausea stuck around to kick it with me a while longer, but the blindness didn't come back. Thank freaking goodness.

I just went to a doctor on campus, and she said it was an extreme ocular migraine - so no headache, but an eyeball shitshow. It's nice to have a diagnosis, but I do not want it to happen again, ever. I'm not sure I could handle it.

What a day, man.

7 comments:

dethbakin said...

Dude, that is freaking scary. I am so glad you are okay now!

Ronak Davé said...

You are the THIRD person that I have heard have this crazy atypical migrane in the last 2 weeks! So wierd!

It made one of my friends feel better to know that my sister was having the same thing -- as a side effect of her pregnancy. Perhaps it will make you feel better that a good friend of mine had a similar experience just last week while driving. Body numbness and all.

I'm glad to hear that you are doing ok! Eat well, drink lots of water, and....

Oh, and bake a batch of funfetti cupcakes. Helps in every scenario.

Caitlin said...

yikes-o!

kiira gustafson said...

Yikes! I had one of those in 4th grade. All of a sudden I couldn't see the book I was reading and fell over.

Scary shit.

Glad you're feeling better, G!

Mike G. said...

i SERIOUSLY doubt Google would let you go just cuz you lost your sight. i'd bet they have damn sophisticated technology for the blind. so you'd be good.

and of course i'd never leave you... glad you realized that even in your dire state. how good of a boyfriend am i...? i mean seriously.

Hilary said...

Ahhh! That is terrifying!! I'm glad you're okay!!!

Vanessa said...

HOLY JESUS *#&#$*@#)#@!!!!!!!! Well, I'm glad you're okay anyway. But hey, my mom does accessibility for the blind at the big Goog, so she could totally help out in this situation. If it were for real. Which, you know, totally good that it's not.