Migraines and Sports

Published August 26, 2024 by helentastic67

I’ve had migraines since I was young. I don’t remember when they began, I just remember how my Mum solved them. I remember she made a furtive call to whom I didn’t know. Then she would take me on a drive, across town, out on the old freeway, down the road opposite my first primary school, down a dirt road that was a driveway, and after parking next to a building, we entered from the back into a waiting room. it had plywood panels on the walls with long coloured ribbons hanging around most of the wall space.

Apparently, my osteo was also a bull breeder that had awards, not your average osteo. He had a rather Dutch name. Upon entering a buzzer alerted the Doctor his patient had arrived and he would come in before we even sat down.

I remember the last time I went to see him; my dad had offered to take me as he had come home from work and as my Mum had been busy making dinner he volunteered to take me. He didn’t know where it was so with my migraine I directed him. I have to say, he did not trust the location for this “hocus pocus” form of medicine. I remember going inside and how uncomfortable he was. The Doctor arrived and I had to remove my T-Shirt, never does a 12-year-old girl feel so uncomfortable. a towel draped over my non-existent boobies, adjustments, massage and stretching and a payment made then back home again for the magic to settle the pain.

Forty years later, I still see a chiropractor and yesterday I told her I’d had a weeklong Walking/Talking migraine which is my regular these days, it’s just enough to annoy me but not enough to cripple me so I can ignore adulting and responsibilities and just go to bed.

She asked what parts of my face was I feeling it? Because I can usually narrow it down. Left eye, right eye, the thing, the thing or the other thing, this time, while lying on my back I used my hand to wave over my face. “My face! my whole fucking face! like I’ve been hit in the face with a basketball!” I’m really glad people can find humour in my pain.

I do sometimes wonder what happened to that Osteo who breeds bulls and I did about 15 years ago see someone down in Geelong that turned out to be the nephew with the same surname. What a tiny world we live in. It does weirdly help.

Inclusion

Published May 27, 2024 by helentastic67

Inclusion

There is a weird thing about disability that people are oblivious to. It’s always feeling like I’m undervalued, misunderstood and the weirdest thing is being excluded simply by not actively including me, or someone like me. It is not always about me.

But I’m aware I push in often to remind people of my very existence, not everyone feels confident to speak up or make their presence known or heard.

Then, there’s the other times I commentate when sharing an experience with others on how I’ve been treated. They don’t even need to ask, I tell them, “It’s what I want to say, but knew better?”

But there are even people, like family I don’t speak my mind to because I presume, based on previous experience they will be offended, it will go terribly, so I bury the pain deeper.

Anonymous

Published November 11, 2019 by helentastic67

Anonymous

I think I might need to write a book one day, which I will need to publish under a pseudonym and that would be because it would definitely require a warning about antidepressants and a requirement from pharmaceuticals to do something about the crazy dreams I keep having.

Case in point:

I’m with a group of guys (I don’t know, but I seem to in this reality), a guy is walking me around a shop pointing out which things to grab. He seems not to care who sees or hears him. We are in a shop with jewellery, crystals and incense. There are a lot of crystal figurines and such, it’s not a place I recognise.

Later in the evening, I’m back in the shop with now a group of guys, I’m walking around grabbing the items that were earlier pointed out to me. I put my hand into my bag and pull out my Nanna granny shopping bag. I find it’s inside out and I can’t quickly put it in the right way one handed. I ask the guy closest to me if he will help and we both notice at the same time he has a matching bag. We wordlessly brush it off. Embarrassing and I put the items in my bag anyway.

We escape the shop as the police arrive, darting down a quiet street in a residential area. It’s a long weekend and there are a few taxi’s about to fill up with families, young children and luggage. There are terrace houses, I don’t recognise with small front yards and a footpath that cuts along the first of all of them.

I’m alone now, walking along the footpath that is raised up along an embankment. I don’t remember which house I’m to go in. I’m not faster than the guys, just got there a different way. Two of the guys are now nearby telling me which house to duck into.

Later, I’m moving through a busy marketplace and going down some metal stairs with a handrail. Not very accessible but I manage going down my left foot on each step.

Left foot. Left foot.

My adrenaline is rushing. I get to the bottom of the steps and I’m in a weird kinda tattoo/hairdressers. One of the guys I was with earlier is standing there and before he had longer hair and now, he has a very blunt doo at just under his ears. Not stylish at all. While we are not alone, I still give him some sass. I give him some shit about his new hairdo, it’s terrible.

It was done so he can be unrecognisable if he is caught. All of a sudden, I realise my hair is down, all curly and fluffy around my shoulders. I feel the whizzing around my head.

Next, the police come in behind me, I’m on my knees and the haircut is nearly complete. My lost vision as I came awake is me with a mostly buzzed off hairstyle with what was left of my hair coming out from somewhere off the top/back of my head, a long thick dry messy plait.