with a mostly invisible disability when I lived with vertigo for 11 months. I experienced much of what you did - and also experienced it as a gift to be reminded (and more mindful) of the reality that as severely disabling as it was, it was only temporary.
Looking back, I am grateful to be still caught off guard every once in a while when I do - without thinking - things which took my last spoon when vertigo was a central rather than the extreme peripheral part of my life it is now.
I vividly recall:
- the first Metro ride in DC - and the panic I felt when I realized that I might not be able to stand up and move to the exit quickly enough after the train was still enough that I could actually get out of my seat
- the fear I felt riding down an escalator - cane in front of me becuase I needed it to stabilize me as I stepped off the escalator - being shoved from behind and torn between turning around and yelling at the shover to stop so I didn't do a face plant, and the reality that I didn't have time to do that before I had to step off the escalator or be trampled.
- The constant jostling by people who were oblivious to personal space (even though I used a cane whenever I went out in public primarily as a visual sign that I was not stable).
- The regular panic attacks I started having because of incidents like the above, and how constantly tired I felt any day I had to do anything in public, and
- just recently, being caught off guard by the utter freedom I felt walking up a moving escalator without holding the rails - something I could not have done not just about a year prior, and something I had taken completely for granted a year before that.
I would not wish my year of vertigo on anyone - but I think we would be much more aware of, and welcoming of, individuals who face chronic challenges living if we each periodically shared that experience.
= new reply since forum marked as read