Big health update
This is a big health update. I was hoping to talk to people individually, but a combination of things has meant that some information went public much earlier than I had intended, so I’m going to post an explanation and clarification here. Email or comment if you have further questions.
Last Sunday, I had a health scare. It turned out to be not as big a deal as we were worried. This is still correct, but it did turn out to be worse than we then concluded. I showed symptoms of a stroke on my face: numbness, loss of muscle use on one side of my face, etc., but still had clear speech and other coordination. My doctors have said that it was not a stroke, but was a very serious seizure. These seizures have developed out of my migraines, which have been getting increasingly serious since November, which is when I started experiencing the levels of exhaustion and illness that you guys have seen me post about. I’ve also been diagnosed with a complex sleep disorder.
As of this week, my doctors have officially said that I am at high risk for a stroke in the near future if I keep working as I am, and have ordered me out of work on disability. My last day of work is planned to be March 31, though this is still somewhat tentative. I am probably taking next year to go part time at the most. Since I was probably being laid off from my job anyway, this isn’t actually much of an alteration to plans even without my health, it just makes it more inevitable. And this is something I’ve needed to do for some time. I’m going to continue with graduate school. It’s been going really well, and is actually a source of fun and relaxation rather than stress, so my doctors have recommended I keep at it. Since it’s a distance program, I can do that without much difficulty. This makes me happy. We’re also going to be moving. Not sure exactly where yet. Nothing’s official, though we have a couple of ideas on the table. We were going to do this anyway, because our current landlords have been raising rent and fees and are out of our price range as of next year. So this is, again, just a push toward what we were already doing.
This whole thing is a big life change. It’s going to be tough, emotionally, logistically, financially, and in lots of other ways I can’t even imagine yet. But it’s also a direction that I think has been kind of inevitable for my life for quite some time, and while I wish it had happened in another way - including, ye gods, without a stroke risk - I am also aware that this is in many ways a push in ways I need to be moving anyway. I am going to be fine in the long run, this is just a twist in the journey.
Last Sunday, I had a health scare. It turned out to be not as big a deal as we were worried. This is still correct, but it did turn out to be worse than we then concluded. I showed symptoms of a stroke on my face: numbness, loss of muscle use on one side of my face, etc., but still had clear speech and other coordination. My doctors have said that it was not a stroke, but was a very serious seizure. These seizures have developed out of my migraines, which have been getting increasingly serious since November, which is when I started experiencing the levels of exhaustion and illness that you guys have seen me post about. I’ve also been diagnosed with a complex sleep disorder.
As of this week, my doctors have officially said that I am at high risk for a stroke in the near future if I keep working as I am, and have ordered me out of work on disability. My last day of work is planned to be March 31, though this is still somewhat tentative. I am probably taking next year to go part time at the most. Since I was probably being laid off from my job anyway, this isn’t actually much of an alteration to plans even without my health, it just makes it more inevitable. And this is something I’ve needed to do for some time. I’m going to continue with graduate school. It’s been going really well, and is actually a source of fun and relaxation rather than stress, so my doctors have recommended I keep at it. Since it’s a distance program, I can do that without much difficulty. This makes me happy. We’re also going to be moving. Not sure exactly where yet. Nothing’s official, though we have a couple of ideas on the table. We were going to do this anyway, because our current landlords have been raising rent and fees and are out of our price range as of next year. So this is, again, just a push toward what we were already doing.
This whole thing is a big life change. It’s going to be tough, emotionally, logistically, financially, and in lots of other ways I can’t even imagine yet. But it’s also a direction that I think has been kind of inevitable for my life for quite some time, and while I wish it had happened in another way - including, ye gods, without a stroke risk - I am also aware that this is in many ways a push in ways I need to be moving anyway. I am going to be fine in the long run, this is just a twist in the journey.