2002-03-08 - 1:06 p.m.
There was a time once, after I graduated from art school and came back to Toronto, and before I found work, when I became unbalanced. Not mentally. But in an absolutely literal, physical way. I lost my balance, and somehow couldn't find it again.
Now, I've never been exactly what you'd call the athletic type, but I did gymnastics for a while as a child, and yoga as a teenager, and had managed until then to retain a fairly good degree of balance and flexibility. But suddenly it was like I couldn't trust my feet - going downstairs became a daily brush with death. Riding the subway meant clinging desperately to the pole, or else the least rattle or jerk would send me to the ground in an ungraceful heap. I lived in fear of rain, snow, and ice, and would shuffle along in it like someone three times my age. And forget climbing over things, or ducking under things, or jumping across even the smallest of spaces. Suddenly everything had to be tentative, slow, and cautious.
And it's the kind of thing that makes *itself* worse. Since I couldn't trust my body anymore, I held it more and more stiffly, afraid of slipping and falling, of the embarrassment and pain. And the stiffer I held myself, the clumsier I got. And the clumsier I got, the more I was tense and rigid and miserable. Things which are usually natural and unthinking became a matter of conscious effort - I found myself having to concentrate to walk normally, or think physical actions through before doing them, so that they became a series of jerky, disconnected steps, rather than something that flowed naturally. I I became so self-conscious that even breathing suddenly seemed laborious and unnatural - was a I breathing too deeply? Too shallowly? Too loudly? Could I breathe? Was I, in fact, breathing? My athsma had never been stress-triggered before, but now these thoughts could set me to wheezing and puffing in moments...
I went to the doctor and tried to explain what was happening. He checked my inner ear and found no detectable problem. He tapped my knees, looked at my bruises, and sent me to a neurologist. The neurologist made me do the strange and amusing thing that a neurological work-up involves, and eventually reported to my doctor that he couldn't see any sign of organic damage or problems, and that he didn't think I had MS or anything, which had been one of my fears. My doctor said he didn't know what to tell me - maybe I had some kind of virus - viruses can do peculiar things to you sometimes. Or maybe it was all in my head. Maybe my unbalance was metaphorical as well as literal. He told me to get more exercise and drink less caffeine. And that's more or less where he left me with it.
Eventually, slowly, most of the problems seemed to clear up on their own. Though I still periodically freeze up in the middle of going downstairs, suddenly unsure of my footing. Especially when I got new glasses and suddenly had depth perception again...
But I still remember how it felt. And sometimes I think that some of it sunk in to my attitudes and feelings about the world in a subtle and pernicious way - like I stopped trusting not only my physical self, but my other capabilities too, to meet challenges, take on responsibility, learn new things, all that blah diddy blah stuff. Or maybe it's the other way around - maybe I was feeling that first, and it just manifested itself physically? Maybe it was all in my head to begin with? Either way, sometimes I think that it's part of why, at this point in my life, I'm feeling kind of stuck. Like something has to change. But I don't know exactly what yet, or exactly how... I mean, I'm back in school and everything, which is a change, and attempting for once in my life to make some longer-term plans, but... that's not quite enough. Or maybe I'm just an instant gratification junkie, and am futilely waiting for the bells and whistles and big puffs of purple smoke or whatever will declare, "Huzzah! There you go, life all good and changed now..."
