Return of Das Blinkenlights
Oct. 26th, 2009 12:24 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
dragonlady7Another optical migraine last night. Trying to find a common thread. I know one other time I had one, it was following a hard roller derby practice involving drills where you threw yourself on the ground and rolled over, at high speed. I theorized then that possibly the combination of impact and whirling motion was a trigger. Last night, we were doing a blocking drill and my partner fell in front of me, too sprawled for me to evade; I hit her and flipped up and over, landing very, very hard on my chest. I wrenched my shoulder and had the breath forced from me, and it took me a minute to get up. Within a few minutes I was skating again, but I decided to take a few laps to refocus and make sure I wasn't injured before I got back into blocking. But the rink floor was filthy, and on the far turn, three times, I wiped out on debris. (First a cocktail toothpick, then a rubber band, and I never found out what took me into the wall the third time, though someone pointed out that there had been water on the floor there earlier that we'd tried to clean up with paper towels, so it was probably residual dampness.) It was infuriating, and shook me up even worse.
I took two ibuprofen right after practice, and stayed late to help with the skating assessments scheduled for after our practice. I don't hydrate well during team practices, as they tend to be intense and focused and not so much with the stopping to drink water. So there I was with my clipboard, trying to fill out the form as my skater completed various tasks, and I found myself blinking and squinting. Had I looked at a bright light? There was a dim spot in my vision. It moved around a bit, there were others... Oh. They were stair-stepping Christmas lights. Oh. Migraine.
I thought about trying to hand off my clipboard to someone else to finish up the assessments, but there weren't any spare volunteers to hand, so I figured I'd tough it out: there was no pain, only considerable visual discomfort. It's really unpleasant to deal with moving blind spots, and very disorienting. I kept shaking my head, as if that would help. Moving my body seemed to help-- at least it distracted me. So I paced around the floor barefoot, watching my skater. She was an experienced skater, a four-season veteran, returning after an injury, so I was sure she could complete the tasks, but of course I had to pay attention regardless-- there was indeed one task she couldn't complete because her injury was still too sore. But I feel I did her justice.
The upside is that by the end of the assessments (which took forever, as they do), the blind spots had solidified into tunnel vision, and even that was beginning to fade. So I drove home much more safely (of course in the dark and the rain, of course, my least favorite conditions visually) than I would have if I'd fled the rink at the first sign of trouble. I should pay attention to the duration of these things, for future reference, and know that if I'm in little pain, I should just stay where I am instead of, as in the past, trying to drive home quickly before it gets bad. If it's not going to last long, I'm better off sitting somewhere and drinking water until it's over. I don't see well as it is, and my awful vision bisected by blinking lights and absences of visual data does not make for a very safe combination.
Bleah.
Anyway-- had a lovely craft night session at liesl's in Rochester on Saturday night. We went straight from work, so we arrived around 6:30 and started drinking right away. We did no actual crafting that night-- well about an inch of knitting, maybe, among all of us-- and Liesl's work friends left around midnight, probably thinking us very debauched. But the next morning in various states of hangover, we all rolled out our craft supplies and got working. Z is learning cross-stitch and had made himself an awesome pattern, upon which he is progressing beautifully-- he's already better at it than me. Other Dave had a garment pattern he was making a muslin of. And i started work on the first of my Snuggie Project. Sleeves are done and body is cut out, just have to combine them. Should've done that this morning, but I have a headache, of all things. It's not bad and is easing as I drink more water.
Grumble grumble about work. I'll think about it another time. Grr. Scheduling nonsense, for the most part, and annoyance over money. As ever. Onward and upward.
I took two ibuprofen right after practice, and stayed late to help with the skating assessments scheduled for after our practice. I don't hydrate well during team practices, as they tend to be intense and focused and not so much with the stopping to drink water. So there I was with my clipboard, trying to fill out the form as my skater completed various tasks, and I found myself blinking and squinting. Had I looked at a bright light? There was a dim spot in my vision. It moved around a bit, there were others... Oh. They were stair-stepping Christmas lights. Oh. Migraine.
I thought about trying to hand off my clipboard to someone else to finish up the assessments, but there weren't any spare volunteers to hand, so I figured I'd tough it out: there was no pain, only considerable visual discomfort. It's really unpleasant to deal with moving blind spots, and very disorienting. I kept shaking my head, as if that would help. Moving my body seemed to help-- at least it distracted me. So I paced around the floor barefoot, watching my skater. She was an experienced skater, a four-season veteran, returning after an injury, so I was sure she could complete the tasks, but of course I had to pay attention regardless-- there was indeed one task she couldn't complete because her injury was still too sore. But I feel I did her justice.
The upside is that by the end of the assessments (which took forever, as they do), the blind spots had solidified into tunnel vision, and even that was beginning to fade. So I drove home much more safely (of course in the dark and the rain, of course, my least favorite conditions visually) than I would have if I'd fled the rink at the first sign of trouble. I should pay attention to the duration of these things, for future reference, and know that if I'm in little pain, I should just stay where I am instead of, as in the past, trying to drive home quickly before it gets bad. If it's not going to last long, I'm better off sitting somewhere and drinking water until it's over. I don't see well as it is, and my awful vision bisected by blinking lights and absences of visual data does not make for a very safe combination.
Bleah.
Anyway-- had a lovely craft night session at liesl's in Rochester on Saturday night. We went straight from work, so we arrived around 6:30 and started drinking right away. We did no actual crafting that night-- well about an inch of knitting, maybe, among all of us-- and Liesl's work friends left around midnight, probably thinking us very debauched. But the next morning in various states of hangover, we all rolled out our craft supplies and got working. Z is learning cross-stitch and had made himself an awesome pattern, upon which he is progressing beautifully-- he's already better at it than me. Other Dave had a garment pattern he was making a muslin of. And i started work on the first of my Snuggie Project. Sleeves are done and body is cut out, just have to combine them. Should've done that this morning, but I have a headache, of all things. It's not bad and is easing as I drink more water.
Grumble grumble about work. I'll think about it another time. Grr. Scheduling nonsense, for the most part, and annoyance over money. As ever. Onward and upward.
