Lightheaded

January 2014

The first medication they tried was midodrine, a little white pill that looked essentially harmless that she was instructed to take three times a day. It was supposed to constrict the blood vessels in her legs to help raise her blood pressure. Instead, it made her feel like bugs were crawling in her hair and as if she constantly had a fever.

Dr. Collins assured her the side effects would subside before classes began and the prescription papers assured her that her doctor had chosen this medication because “the benefits outweigh the side effects”. Jillian thought it was a load of bullshit.

She spent most of her days on the sofa, calling out of work and dreading the day classes began. Harry was terrified to leave her alone at first, but he had both work and his internship. He didn’t really have a choice. Jillian assured him she wouldn’t push herself, she’d follow the doctor’s instructions and call him if she needed absolutely anything.

The days seemed to stretch on forever. They were filled with naps on the sofa and lots of Gatorade and salty soup broths to rehydrate her and raise her blood pressure and volume. They were lonely too, which she wasn’t used to. Before she got sick (that was still a new term she was nervously toeing the line of using) she cherished alone time, especially growing up with two siblings. But that was back when she could stand long enough to paint.

The first side effect she noticed began a few days in, just after Harry had left for work. She’d just woken up to take her first dose of midodrine and was wrapped in blankets on the sofa, mind hazy and the sounds of the city muffled, when she noticed it. It wasn’t quite an itch, it was something different that began at the base of her neck.

She ignored it at first, running her fingers through her hair mindlessly and flipping through channels on the television. It was still early, her brain was still waking up and it was taking longer than usual since her doctor had instructed her to cut down on caffeine.

She’d only skimmed the side effects so she didn’t scare herself out of starting the medication, so she didn’t think anything of it. She managed a piece of toast and half of a banana for breakfast, which she was quite proud of, and ended up laying on the floor, stretching her calves and thighs like her doctor had showed her. The hope was that she’d be able to strengthen her muscles enough to pump her blood properly again without needing physical therapy.

By the time she was done her muscles ached, her heart was pounding, and there was a sickeningly strange sensation occurring on her scalp. It was almost an itch, almost a tingle, but her brain was convinced there were bugs crawling in her hair.

She sat up instinctively, hands going to her hair despite her vision going dark. Her hands couldn’t feel anything and that sped her heart up even more. Maybe it was lice or something she couldn’t see or feel with her hands.

She stumbled to the bathroom, unsure which was worse, her anxiety or her POTS symptoms as the walls spun around her. The bathroom mirror didn’t show her anything, but that didn’t calm her down. It felt too real, it felt like a nightmare. She wondered if she was finally having a psychotic break.

She could feel the tears welling up in her eyes, stinging and burning, and the panic boiling in her chest like a tea kettle waiting to whistle. She felt like she was losing it. Maybe she was. Maybe it was all in her head.

She dropped to her knees in front of the small tub, yanking at the rusted knobs until ice cold water was pouring from the tap. She held her breath, hands gripping the side of the tub until her knuckles turned white, and dunked her head under the stream of water.

It took her breath away and sent a chill down her spine. Her heart stuttered in her chest as she let the water rinse through all of her long, dark hair. She didn’t realize she was crying until she’d shut the tap off, until she realized it hadn’t taken the sensation away. She wanted to rip all of her hair out from the root.

She felt pathetic and unstable and nauseous as she ended up on the cold bathroom floor, wet hair tied up in a towel haphazardly and her phone in her shaky hands dialing a number she knew by heart.

“Hi, Jillian,” her mother’s voice was safe and familiar, almost enough like home, “How are you feeling?”

“M-mama,” she was blubbering like a baby, relief sweeping through her at the sound of Sarah’s voice. She could fix it. She could tell her what to do. That was what mothers were for.

“Oh honey,” she cooed, “What’s wrong? What happened?”

She let it all spill out, huddled up on the harsh floor. Her thoughts and fears and pain and side effects. She put it all into her mother’s hands, begging her to hold the burden for a little while the way she used to rock her as a kid when she’d scraped her knee.

*

Classes began on a Wednesday which Jillian was grateful for because it meant she only had one class. She just had to survive one class and the train ride there and back. It sounded like nothing at all, but it felt monumental.

Harry woke her up with coffee and toast slathered in peanut butter and honey. She managed half of her breakfast, splitting it with him on the sofa. She swallowed her little, white pill and managed to pull on some leggings and a sweater. She brushed her hair and teeth but when she looked in the mirror, she hardly recognized herself.

The bags under her eyes were deep and dark, her eyes were bloodshot and tired. Her face was thinner, more hollow. She looked worse than she had in years. She couldn’t calculate how much weight she’d lost or when it had slipped away. All she knew was that she looked like the shell of the girl that had first moved into their apartment and it terrified her, made her look away and spit out her chalky toothpaste.

Harry insisted on walking her to the subway station, slowly and steadily. She tried to fight it but deep down, she was relieved.

“‘M gonna be alright,” she mumbled as he steadied her on the stairs down to the platform. But her voice shook and it felt more like she was asking than telling.

“Course,” his arm squeezed her through her winter coat. She could already feel the suffocating heat of the station and she wanted to peel the baby pink material right off.

When they reached the bottom of the stairs he stopped, holding his arm out for her bag as if he could read her mind. She smiled, half sheepish and half grateful, before tearing off her layers of material and twisting her hair on top of her head. She wasn’t sure she would survive even a spring in Florida with her new condition.

“Thank you,” she breathed when she’d caught her balance again, leaning up to press a kiss to his cheek.

He shook his head, cheeks pink from the cold, “Text me, yeah?”

“I will.”

He stayed and watched her until her train arrived, despite her stuck out tongue and her texts encouraging him to go so he wasn’t late to the office. He was too good to her, she wasn’t deserving of it. She could only hope he didn’t tire of taking care of her before she found some magic pill to sort out her body. She thought it was that simple.

She made it to class in one piece, out of breath and head spinning. She nearly collapsed in her seat, tearing her layers off again. She tried her hardest to pay attention, to focus on anything other than how exhausted and sick she felt. She tried to take notes and participate and ask questions, but it was a hundred times harder than it had been before. It felt like every little action took ten times more energy than it used to.

She texted Harry sporadically, knowing he’d worry himself sick if she didn’t. She was trying to keep up the act, that she had everything under control, that she didn’t need to tell anyone else what was going on because she’d sort it out in time. She thought it was something she could sort out, something that would fall into place or work itself out with time.

Her class ended five minutes early so she collected her things as slowly as possible, knowing what would inevitably happen when she stood up. The last thing she needed was one of her classmates noticing. She stood up slowly, stretching her calves onto her tiptoes in an attempt to pump her blood like her doctor had taught her, but the room still spun enough that she had to blink quickly and lean against her chair for support. No one seemed to notice, too wrapped up in themselves and each other and rushing off to their next class.

She willed her body to obey her, to at least make it out of the classroom and to somewhere that she could sit down. Her belongings felt heavier than she remembered as she trudged out the door, but so did her head and her limbs. She was the last person out and as soon she was out of the building, cold air shocking her system, she collapsed back against the brick wall.

“Jesus, you were the last one out,” a voice startled her at what felt like the exact moment she’d shut her eyes, hoping for relief from the persistent dizziness and nausea.

Her eyelids fluttered, “Harry?”

There he was, hands shoved in his coat pockets and worry lines creasing his forehead. She thought maybe she was hallucinating, maybe she’d passed out and hit her head. Or maybe, more likely than either of those, she had the best best friend in the world.

“You got out early,” he shook his head, beginning to unload her bag off of her shoulder and onto his, “I thought maybe I’d missed you-”

“What’re you-” she shook her own head, trying to clear her head enough to form coherent sentences.

“Took my lunch a bit early,” he shrugged, as if it were nothing, no big deal to come back halfway across the city, “Wanted to make sure you were alright. We can pick up some Pret soup on the way home if you like.”

She nodded, looking at him in awe. She knew by the time they got back to the apartment, his lunch would be almost over and he’d have to head straight back to the office to work his ass off without real pay. She knew he was exhausted, she could see the bags under his eyes. She knew he had to be hungry, he’d only had a piece of toast with her for breakfast. But there he was, putting her first, taking care of her, loving her.

*

Jillian thought she could make it work like that, dividing her life into neat little boxes and not letting them intermingle. She thought she could keep things under control. She thought no one else needed to know.

When she went back to work with bags under her eyes and the world spinning around her, she kept her mouth shut. When her coworkers or bosses asked what was going on, she forced innocent white lies past gritted teeth and chapped lips. When she needed to sit down or throw up or breathe, she disappeared quietly to the tiny bathroom or out the back door. She thought that was the kind of ‘managing’ her doctor had told her she would eventually learn to do, even if it was absolutely exhausting.

She tried to schedule her part time shifts around days that she had classes, she tried not to spread herself as thin as she had been before, but it didn’t matter. She felt like her illness was taking over, sucking everything out of her. Hiding it at work was even more exhausting but she was determined. She hadn’t thought it would come crashing down around her.

It was a Wednesday. She knew it was going to be a worse day than usual when she woke up with spots and her vision and her heart pounding in her throat before her feet even hit the floor. She knew she was going to have to call into work with a shitty excuse that would make her look flaky and unreliable, yet again.

Her hands shook as she dialed the familiar number. She hoped Zayn or another coworker would pick up and take the message. Usually the older couple that owned the shop weren’t around until mid afternoon, near the end of her shift.

Instead, her manager and the owners’ daughter, Sarah, answered with her cheery, customer service voice. Jillian contemplated hanging up and suffocating herself in her pillow.

“S-Sarah, hi,” her voice cracked with sleep and she hoped it would help her case, “It’s Jillian.”

“Jillian,” her tone shifted immediately and Jillian’s stomach sank, “What’s up?”

“I-I’m so sorry to be so last minute again,” she began, closing her eyes and wrapping her comforter around her a little tighter, “I-I’m not gonna be able to make it in again-”

Sarah cut her off with a sigh and Jillian wished her bed would swallow her whole. She imagined the creaky hardwood floor giving out underneath and letting her fall through to the basement.

“We’re going to have to let you go, Jillian.”