Tuesday update

I am still not 100 percent, and the lightheadedness stuff is starting to worry me.

If I drink at a water fountain and stand up suddenly, whoosh. If I climb a flight of stairs, just up one floor, whoosh.

I never used the elevator at work. Since this illness weekend before last, I have to.

The lightheadedness I'm talking about lasts 8 or 10 seconds. I've referred to it as dizziness, but it's not dizziness in the sense of the room seeming to spin around or anything like that. Rather I feel much the way I do when I wake up in the morning and in the time between sleep and full wakefulness, I'm not here and I'm not asleep.

A quick Google search suggested this is a symptom of permanent heart damage. Maybe I should see a doctor. But there are usually several other symptoms present at the same time, such as swelling of the ankles, and I don't have any of the other symptoms.

An interesting point: during those eight or ten second spells, everything is there. Everything looks the same. Nothing is stretching into odd shapes like you see in movies, or changing colors, or turning monochrome. But my surroundings don't look... well, real. The effect is much like waking from a dream, except that when the blood eventually catches up to the brain, I don't 'awaken'... I just settle back into the 'dream'.

I'm not seeking to recreate the experience, because it's pretty damn scary. But when it happens, it's like I'm right on the brink of losing my illusions about the existence of objects, only to be brought back to this world.

I came home this evening, ate two peanut butter and banana sandwiches, a bowl of microwave vegetarian vegetable soup, and a handful of chips. Went to sleep by 6:30 and am only now waking up.

You know what I need to do? I mean, besides see a doctor? Make a will.