I woke too early this morning, got up to pee, went back to bed to grab a few more minutes of precious sleep. So tired. Ready for it. I laid down, instantly comfortable, and started to drift off…

…The world seemed to spin madly off its axis unexpectedly. Vertigo. Fuck. How bad would it be this time? I held on to the edge of the bed (no idea why it reliably seems this should help, it doesn’t, really), hoping it might just clear up right quick and perhaps I’d still sleep… No such luck. I rolled ever-so-carefully onto my back, reminding myself continuously in my head that the spinning isn’t real. I reminded myself to remain calm. To breathe through it. To let things settle down, patiently. This makes about half a dozen serious vertigo “events” I’ve experienced since the first one, which was, as I recall, back in 2014? 2015? Before I moved into my own place. After menopause, but before the headache came. It doesn’t matter in the moment that I’m enduring the vertigo, just gives my mind something to play with while I wait it out… like a string, offered to a cat. I remind myself to follow up with my GP that the vertigo is still “a thing”.

Best I can figure, with what I know, I most likely slept in one posture for too long, that may have pressed my neck “too bent” in one specific direction (in this case, tilted away from my left side toward my right, as I slept) and when I laid back down (on the other side, head bent in the other direction)… vertigo. It remains sufficiently rare that I count and make note of every occurrence. It’s problematic mostly because, from my own perspective, it is scary as fuck. It passes, though.

I moved on with the morning. Greeted my Traveling Partner. Made coffee. Read the news, briefly (long enough to be certain I didn’t find anything word actually reading waiting for me). Then face getting on with the work day ahead of me.

When I sat down at my desk, I leaned left (and tilted my head, also left) to turn on my laptop – vertigo. Fucking hell. I sit upright. Posture very correct. Very still. Breathing. Waiting. Holding the edge of my desk. When it passes, I go back to sipping coffee and start the work day.

It’s worth noting that I’ve recently been trying to get back to working on fitness goals. I enjoy playing Beat Saber in VR for some of my exercise – super fun. I started getting back into that over the weekend after some months away from it (the move, then time just got away from me). It’s rather taxing on my neck, and seems the likely cause of this recurrence of my vertigo. I find myself bothered that it has become “my vertigo”… a thing I deal with often enough to consider it a thing I deal with. Fuck.

Well… damn. I guess it amounts to another opportunity to practice healthy practices. To take better care of the woman in the mirror. To take my fitness needs seriously, but also approach them with consideration and care. To be patient with myself. To be thorough about taking note of changes in my health generally. Adult shit.

The day has begun in earnest. The sky is gray, the day chilly. My arthritis pain is noteworthy, but I am distracted by my concern over the vertigo, and overlook it for now. I need more coffee. There is a long holiday weekend ahead, and it’s already time to begin again. 🙂