My Trouble With Travel

I've written a bit, here and there, in my Facebook status updates, especially today while traveling to Traverse City and back. While I do joke about it, I have a very difficult time riding in vehicles, and also being in public places. I've never been a good rider and always did the driving wherever I went, with whomever. On those rare occasions when I had to ride, though, I could handle it.

Now, things are different. For one thing I have lost 95% of the vision in my left eye. All this has done is mess up my distance perception, especially under certain circumstances (ie, with bright light or dim light, or with reflective or transparent objects). The last time I drove, a couple of years ago, I was scared to death. Every mailbox on the side of the road my eye(s) saw as something IN the road. A puddle is a hole in the road. A tree or a pole anywhere near where the road bends is dead center where I will crash into it. The lines between lanes look like posts sticking up out of the road. And even driving at 40mph, it appears that the trees along the roadside are rushing right at me at twice that speed. So given my perceptions, driving AND riding is a scary thing.

Add to that the "cerebrovascular event" that occurred in the fall of 2008. While it presented as a stroke, complete with massive head pain, aphasia, etc. and left me with temporary physical issues, my official "diagnosis" upon release was "headache". Of all the doctors I've seen, then and since, the best explanation has been that I had vascular spasm in my brain that morning. (This makes sense to me as I've had prinzmetal's angina for well over a decade.) And while the initial physical effects have pretty much cleared up with therapy and time, I feel like I have a different brain now. There are quite a few things that are different (I frequently use wrong words or "lose my place" when I'm talking, my incredibly fast and accurate typing skills are no more and I have to retype at least half of my words because I typed a different word than I was thinking, or typed a word in reverse order, or whatever, my multitasking, organizational, and mathematical skills are all but gone, etc.), but put together with the vision issues, I now get differing messages to my brain when riding or driving. What I SEE - which is skewed - and how my brain interprets what I'm seeing - which is skewed - make travel more like a scary amusement park ride than a ride in the car.

Pete and my sister have been able to accommodate me pretty well, either by how they're driving or how they anticipate my reactions and reassure me ahead of time. And Casey is getting better and is at least aware. But when I'm in public, either in a car or on foot, I have become dependent on Pete; he "gets" me. As I am mis-perceiving what I see - and even feel - he can anticipate. He stays on my blind side in public, and watches for perceived "obstacles" in my path. He keeps me appraised of things I can't see...because it isn't just a startle when I turn and run into someone or knock into a display; it is the chaos that happens in my brain because it isn't comprehending, as it used to, all of the input. I will freeze or panic in public places, my brain doesn't take in all of the information, interpret it, and tell me how to proceed in a split second like it used to...it shuts me down, stopping me in my tracks, and I can't do anything at all until I "catch up" to myself - or at least, that's how it feels...

I used to be independent to a fault, stubborn, strong-willed, and 100% self-sufficient. Maybe this is God's way of tempering or softening me? I obviously prefer my well-known home to every other place now. My family watches out for me, no kids are zooming around me as I'm negotiating around a crater (who thought to put those advertisements on the floor at Walmart anyway???) and my limited concentration is centered on that, there aren't curbs to step off - or over - when I have no idea how high it is, or if I'm stepping into a puddle or a hole. I know every tiny dip or rise in the floors. When I'm in public threats are all around, I can't react to them because I misinterpret what I'm seeing or feeling, and my sluggish brain can't seem to catch up from one thing to the next. When I'm with Pete though, I feel as secure as I can be; he's in charge and takes care of me and I can do it. Handing over the same control to anybody else though...like Casey or anyone (other than my sister who also "gets it") else driving me...that's really tough and scary to me.

Weird, huh?