Episode 13 - I Had No Answers So I Built A Process "The Vertigo Experience Part 2"

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Critical thinking sounds clean and academic until the room starts spinning and nobody can tell you why. I’m sharing a personal story that got very real: a sudden vertigo relapse that sent me to the ER, left me throwing up, blurred my vision so badly I couldn’t read my phone, and even came with a scary moment on the monitor when my heart rate dipped to 39. Doctors ran the scans and blood tests, explored a BPPV-style explanation, and still couldn’t give a satisfying answer, which meant I had to build my own way forward.

I walk you through the exact mental moves I leaned on when certainty wasn’t available: remembering what happened eight years ago, tracking patterns in my vision and balance, and treating recovery like a careful experiment of testing, observing, and adapting. I also get honest about the tension between expert advice and lived experience, including why I refused a common vertigo medication based on how my body reacted in the past. If you’ve ever felt dismissed by “everything looks normal,” this will help you think about self-trust, patient advocacy, and decision-making under pressure.

We also zoom out to what “control” really means when you can’t fix the problem immediately: hydration, sleep, stress management, pacing your responsibilities, and staying grounded in meaning. I bring my Indigenous perspective into the reflection, because sometimes the lesson isn’t a diagnosis, it’s what you learn about yourself while you heal. If this hits home, subscribe, share the show with someone who needs it, and leave a review. How do you decide what to do next when life won’t give you answers?

Mundo Mondays

Transcript

Critical Thinking As Survival

SPEAKER_00 0:01

What if critical thinking became a survival tool? In this episode, I became my own case study, adapting step by step when I was dealing with symptoms that didn't have clear answers. Doctors ran tests, everything came back normal. But the experience was still real. So I had to figure out something. This isn't about health. It's about what happens when you're forced to rely on your own observations, your own judgment, and your ability to think clearly in uncertain situations. Because sometimes thinking isn't just a skill, it's the only way forward. So about a few weeks now, I was rushed to the hospital. Before I need to go any further, I need to give a historical context why this is important and why this is something I'm talking about

The First Vertigo Ordeal

SPEAKER_00 1:05

now. So eight years ago, I traveled to Florida for the first time by plane, and when I landed, I was feeling kind of a little dizzy. But while I was in the air, I kind of felt dizzy, dizzy symptoms, but it wasn't really that bad. But by the time I landed, I felt like really lightheaded, very dizzy, and I couldn't explain the situation. I thought it was because of lack of sleep or a lack of eating, because the night before I was really kind of excited and I didn't want to miss my plane. And you know, like when you're going somewhere and you have plans. So I get there to the hotel and I order food and I try to go to sleep, thinking it's just those two things. I wake up a few hours and my head is spinning out of control. Everything is spinning and I cannot tell why. So I eventually felt nauseous, threw up a few times, and then I called the front desk to have them send the ambulance. They came, they picked me up, they took me to the hospital, they ran their tests. By the end of the afternoon, they had said that I had symptoms of vertigo, and they couldn't tell me exactly what caused it or how to get rid of it. They told me anything can cause vertigo. And they told me even smells, foods, experiences sometimes can trigger these types of things. And so I was released, I was, I they admitted me into the hospital, and then for the next two days, I was there trying to regain everything from my balance to seeing straight to understanding this this thing of vertigo that I had. And so I was able to coordinate with the hotel and coordinate with the airline, so I was able to safely get back onto the airplane with all my belongings, fly back, and I suffered for for vertigo for almost two straight months. And I had I was sent to specialists, I had appointments to see different doctors. The thing is, every day I was getting better. And everywhere I went, they had prescribed medicines. And each time they prescribed medicines at these specialists, it kind of would make it worse. And I would go back to square one of having extreme dizziness. And that's how I lived for about two months. Every day, every night, I had that shaky experience. There's only a few times that it would kind of stop and subsided. And eventually one day it just faded away. And why this is important is because this is what happened to me about two weeks ago. And the reason why I'm talking about it now, or no, when you listen to this, it would be about a week ago. Yeah, I think a little more than a week and a half ago. So yeah, almost two weeks. So now that I gave the precursor, here's the incident. The night before, I was dealing with some stress and I was getting a headache and some s spinniness and some dizziness. And I decided to go to sleep. I woke up a few hours later and I lost my balance. I couldn't even see. In my dream, in my sleeping state, as I had my eyes were closed, I could feel everything spinning. And this is when my eyes were closed.

Two Months Of Trial And Error

SPEAKER_00 4:55

And when I woke up, I couldn't even see that far. I couldn't even see the phone. I couldn't even see and make out words on my phone. That's how bad my vision was. I couldn't even see that that close. So I stumbled to make a phone call, and then I tried to get ready, and I called 911. And I lived on I live on kind of on a fair fair fairly decent amount of floors, so I had to figure out how I was gonna do this. The ambulance 911 operator said, Is there a code that we need to get into? Can you make it? And so basically I said, I think I can make it downstairs. And eventually I did. And I waited for the ambulance to arrive. They saw my conditions, they asked me a few questions while I was standing there. I threw up a few times and they made the decision to take me to the hospital. When I got there, I started throwing up some more times, and then they actually uh admitted me into a room in the ER and they monitored me. And in that time, I don't know exactly how or what happened those six hours because everything seems like it's kind of like almost seamless of how six hours passed by so fast. There were times I was sleeping, times that I was a little kind of observant a lot of things, but I was still in my right mind. However, they said my heart had dropped at a low heartbeat of 39, they said. They said an average person's resting heartbeat is 60, and they said mine was at 39. So they were kind of really worried about that with my dizziness. So they admitted me in the hospital and they said we'll monitor you and to see how everything goes. So basically that's what happened. And during that time I was there, they ran all sorts of tests: a CT brain scan to taking my blood, to measure me, to hook me up to a heart monitor, blood tests, different types of scans, and they couldn't find anything at that point. So they continued to order more tests and do more exams while I was there. And they said they would try two more tests. One was to get a physical therapist to see if my my vertigo might could be treated with some of the symptoms of something that's a normal side of that's normally caused a vertigo. I don't have that literature in front of me, but it's kind

The Recent Hospital Rush

SPEAKER_00 7:45

of like BPB or something like that. It's like a something that it's can can be removed suddenly. And usually why they do that test, and this is kind of funny because when I first heard it eight years ago, I thought it was kind of crazy, but they mention it of how it works. So again, I'm not a I'm not a this I'm not a doctor, but a disclaimer. What I'm about to say is just the example of how to explain it simple. So there's these little rocks inside of your head, these little crystals, and they help you balance a lot of stuff. And sometimes those crystals in your head get kind of misaligned or start going somewhere else, and the follicle, I think the follicles in your hair, I'm not too sure, but that gets misaligned and or it throws off your balance and it makes you feel dizzy or nauseous or whatever. You can look it up, there's a lot of different examples and stuff like that. So eight years ago, they did all these different types of exams and stuff like that, and that was one of the tests. And so they said that we're gonna have a physical therapist come and see we can get it treated that way. If that doesn't help, then we'll do a MRI brain scan. So did both of them, not both of them came back as negative, and they kind of figured out what was going on. Same thing that happened eight years ago. So yeah, so it was it was a little kind of disturbing because when you have all these things and there's no clear explanation, then it kind of gets a little frustrating. So your brain s switches from what's wrong to what do I do now? And we get to our critical questions. If all tests say nothing is wrong, but I still feel it, what who what do I trust? Because I talk about critical thinking a lot in this podcast, I will focus on that. In this situation, I think about okay, so last time it lasted for about eight months and it gradually got better. But they did all sorts of exams and stuff like that, and they couldn't find nothing. So is does that mean I have to deal with this for another eight months? So yeah, I have to rely on my own gut feeling and remember how I felt then and what I did and how I adapted. Question two. When there's no clear answers, how do I decide what to do next? Again, past experience. My critical thinking came into like, okay, how do I walk? How do I balance myself? What did I do? What things were of benefit? How was I able to interact with the world? Because I did travel to some of my appointments. I was able to attend class for some of my stuff, I was able to engage in some of the conversations. The only thing that kind of bothered me was that the dizziness was consistent. And that's kind of hard to explain because when you looked at my eyes, my eyes would shake from left to right horizontally. And this time they were saying that it was the same this time. However, by the time I was released, like a day about the next day, or yeah, probably I was released about a day and a half. Is that about right? Yes. Yeah, about a day and a half, because I got there in the morning, then the next day, tests, yeah, roughly about a day and a half. So anyway, as I was leaving, you know, it the dizziness was subsiding a little bit. It was decreasing. And it seemed like okay, but I didn't want to get my hopes too up. And I will talk a little bit more and a little bit off in a little while. Question three. Is uncertainty something I avoid or something I need to learn how to handle? Wow, that's a good question. Well, this is uncertainty of not knowing what. And and in other words, there are people, as I mentioned previously in some of my episodes, about you know, a death deaf guy and a blind guy, and they both make it work.

Tests, BPPV Talk, No Clear Cause

SPEAKER_00 12:10

And they're not complaining, they weren't, you know, mad. Oh, I don't know their story, but you know, they were living their life as normal as possible. And so I know there's disabilities in the world that prevent people from doing things, but it doesn't stop them from living. So in this case, you know, I learned how to handle things in that situation, and I do live alone, so many times I have to figure out things on my own and have to like navigate things on my own, which is kind of difficult at times because I have to rely on myself. Anyway, next section testing, observing, adapting the process. So as I was saying, I was observing the patterns in real time, my vision, my stability, my positioning, and has as I was walking in the hospital trying to maintain my own independence. And I noticed that, you know, look looking left and looking right, looking up and looking down, there were some differences. When I looked straight ahead, there were slight well, by the time I went to the hospital, my vision kind of got better. I was able to see more in front of me. But looking straight ahead, there was a slight gentle rock and motion from side to side and some dizziness. When I looked close and when I looked to the left, everything normalized. There was no shaky, everything was normal, and it made me feel like there was nothing wrong. When I looked to the lower right and left corner, everything seemed perfectly normal. Of course, you can't go through life looking in the lower left corner and because people think you're strange. And if I turn my head 45 degrees and look out of my like my left eye looking down, I look really crazy. So I'm trying to bring bring humor into this. So when I looked right, uh there was my eyes did kind of show some some movement, and that caused more dizziness. When I looked to the top left, it caused a little more dizziness as well. But I noticed every time I was doing these types of things to myself that I was getting myself tired. And, you know, I had to treat this as kind of like an experiment of mine because, you know, this is my life, this is how I'm gonna survive. I need to figure out, you know, things. So eight years ago, I was trying to remember what I did in the hospital, what I did afterwards, and trying to figure out. So one of the things they tried they tried to prescribe me was an anti-vert medicine, antivertical medicine. One of the things they tried to give me was megalazine, I think that's how they say it, which is an anti-vert medicine. It's used for a lot of different things. Disclaimer, it I'm just talking about my experience. So it's supposed to reduce dizziness in people, but for me, it caused more dizziness. Now, I can't remember if I had it in the hospital or not eight years ago, but they tried to prescribe, they did prescribe it uh to me at one of the specialists eight years ago, and I remembered the the medicine because when that medicine makes you feel going back to square one, you remembered, and my body reacted like when I heard the name, I said no. And I told him I'm not taking that medicine. I explained the situation. And the doctors, you know, there told me, hey, you know, it doesn't do that. I said, look, I don't care what you're you what you guys say, this is my health, and this is my situation, and this is what I remember. That medicine will make me cause more dizziness. So I refused it, and they respect those decisions. So I was trying to not make things worse, you know. Like I said, I'm just trying to get better, and I I chose not to take it this time. And, you know, using that personal data alongside with professional input kind of clash, but I'm going off of what I remember and how my body reacted. And if my body reacted negatively, I'm gonna listen to my body, especially if it's my own health. Moving to the next critical questions. How do I balance expert advice with my own lived experience? Well, not everyone's the same, you know. Like there are certain things that will make you allergic to certain things. There are certain foods that make you allergic. And, you know, in those times you have to listen to your body because I can imagine if someone's allergic to something like oranges, you know, you're gonna avoid oranges at at your bare life because you know how it makes you feel. Nothing against oranges. I eat oranges very, very rarely because of my stomach, but besides the point, I'm just trying to make a point. I think it's kind of important to, you know, take medical advice, but also to listen to your body as well. And, you know, my lived experience had a little more weight because eight years ago I I couldn't function normally as everyone else did, because if my world was consistent, vertical for two months, my lived experience is gonna outweigh what a doctor says. Because if they couldn't figure out anything wrong then and all the tests came came out negative, I am gonna trust my lived experience with that. Next question: What patterns can I observe that help me understand what's happening? Well, the vertigo was something really unique to my situation. The way that I felt, the way that I experienced, the way that I had my balance taken from me, I know how those things feel. And, you know, observing those patterns kind of helped me understand what's happening and how I can try to, you know, create at least some comfortability now. And, you know, that's the most important thing because I want to at least have some comfort, some normalcy to kind of make me feel a little sane since I live alone. I want to try to live a normal life and try to observe my own independence as much as possible. Question three. At what point does critical thinking become become trust trust in myself? Let me repeat that.

The Critical Questions Begin

SPEAKER_00 18:48

So, you know, by letting them do the tests, but knowing that some medicines will cause a lot of different types of discomfort and knowing those types of things that you know they don't have any knowledge of because you're in the hospital, you're trying to remember these types of things, and you know, you're trying to do the best in that situation. And you know, critical thinking comes in play from what you've experienced before, and trying to give the doctor a better sense so they can do their job, so they can help you figure out what's going on, or at least help heal you to some degree. So we're gonna move on to the next section. Redefining control moving forward. So, yeah, I am not gonna sugarcoat it, but I was scared. I was scared of how this is gonna be. I was scared not able to walk, I was scared of losing my balance. Yeah, when it first happened to me, I was scared because last time I was by myself and I thought I would never go through this again. And this time I was by myself again, and I figured, how how am I gonna do this again? I'm still going to school, I'm still doing my stuff. How am I gonna manage responsibilities, school, functioning day-to-day? Yeah, it's scary. It's really scary. But at some point you have to let go of the immediate solutions. You know, you have to figure out how you're gonna do this, and you have to focus on you know what you can control. You know, my eating habits, my hydration, rest and stress management. I don't wanna say this, but I will say this because it's part of the context. Someone close to me was in the hospital before all this happened, and I think that's might have caused some distress because this person's important to me. I've known them my entire life, and you know, to have that person in the hospital in this situation, not knowing, it kind of you know put me in a strain where I kinda eat you know, more than one meal a day. I wasn't drinking hydrated myself, I wasn't drinking enough water, I wasn't sleeping enough, I was stressed on how they were doing, not knowing because they live far away. I think some of that was stress that you know might have contributed to this. I don't know. I really don't know. But you know, it's stressful to just be in this situation in my program, you know, being a walk being a far away from home, dealing with everything that's happening in the world, rising cost of living from gas to food to you know, possible uh world war world war you know it's a stressful time it's a stressful time to live and when you have someone close to you end up in the hospital it's even more stressful even though this person says go to school stay in school that's all I want you to do but you focus on them to you know that you know they're a major part of your life moving on recognizing my improvement so there was some improvement when I was released and there was some improvement little by little my dizziness wasn't as strong as it was before when I left I could see straight ahead and I could you know recognize words and I could actually use my phone close up and I could actually see things but there was still some shakiness and the next day I slowly got better by better and Wednesday I had some stressful news and I think that might have caused me to get more stressed out and the next day I just woke up with a little more increased dizziness. My vertigo had increased but then I had to calm myself down try to do what I can try to excuse me try to heal try to reduce my stress try to you know do what I could even looking at YouTube videos trying to figure out what I could do and you know the next day I felt better and now I'm doing a podcast because I wanted to share a story with you guys it does get better and you know I I can see things in front of me they're still kind of blurry but it's not as like it was before today I can look at the screen for the you know second day but I still have like immediate headaches afterwards and yesterday I spent maybe about three hours and I couldn't type but I could look at things and I had to use my mouse to try to you know use different tools on my keyboard. But then I went to sleep and I slept and slept and slept and I woke up tired and exhausted and I think because I pushed myself but that's the thing is I have to push myself I mean no one's gonna do my school work for me no one's gonna you know pay my bills no one's gonna do all these different things it's something I have to do while I can and I should make the best of it so that's what I'm doing I'm adapting trying to adapt now in my previous episodes I talk about time and patience money and the value of well being uncertainty and unpredictability unpredictable unpredictableness I must say that word because I can say that I guess time I will have to be patient because you know time heals all wounds heals all wounds is what I want to kind of stress money and the value of well-being I'm happy to have pretty good insurance and I'm blessed to have that because I think if I didn't have that type of thing I hate to say but money does help in those situations because a lot of times people who are less fortunate may not have those types of resources

Observing Patterns Like An Experiment

SPEAKER_00 25:50

to stay in the hospital or to even get treated or even have these types of tests. And uncertainty and the unpredictable unpredictable nature of tomorrow you know that's just coming at the row of a dice and that's something that we all deal so let's get to our final set of critical questions what does control actually mean when I can't fix the situations immediately it's frustrating. I'm not gonna lie it's frustrating there are things in this world that you can't control there are things in this world that you have no ability to control how much you want to you can have all the money in the world but you can't change history you can have a lot of different things but you can't buy happiness if that makes sense there's some things in this world that you can't control that just happen and you don't know why you don't know for what reason and sometimes it's because there's a a bigger plan a bigger plan that you don't even imagine. Call it fate call it destiny call it whatever you want and this is a podcast about critical thinking but also I've mentioned before I do have these types of things I believe that things happen for a reason reason A happens for reason reason B. Part of my indigenous perspective part of that unique part of me I don't know why this is happening but there's usually something that I gain out of it trust for life maybe I forgot about what that means maybe I'm living outside of my comfort zone I don't know what that is but usually reflection and that time and patience I talked about earlier usually gives me time when I'm healing to kind of remind me of what I'm going to school for. Why am I here? Why am I alone in this situation? Why am I doing a podcast? Those types of things question two Am I trying to rush recovery because I feel pressure from time or responsibility I'm not even gonna lie I'm rushing recovery so I can get back to normalcy because that's what it comes back to the person who told me to stay in school how much time do they have left if I don't complete it enough time their wish for me to stay in school if I don't stay in school who's gonna pay my bills the two are not related so I want to make that perfectly clear point this first thing and the second thing are not related by money in that situation. No they're not I feel like there's more responsibility that I have to stay in school my research the the things I'm doing the conversations the interactions have a bigger

Refusing A Med Based On Experience

SPEAKER_00 29:35

meaning in that and I feel like this is a struggle that I have to push through so even though how much I have a headache I have to focus on school I cannot let another two months go by if I have to sit in front of the computer hours on in and sleep 10 12 hours a day just to get my stuff done then I will do it. Why why am I gonna put myself through that critical thinking says that to learn from my experiences and to adapt in that situation. Eight years ago I lost a semester I had to start from scratch it was hard it was hard to cra crawl back and if I fail and if I fall short this time around I'm gonna lose that time I'm gonna lose that that mo that momentum I know that this is probably not something people want to hear but I have to push myself and I'm gonna push myself I want you guys to understand that my decision to move forward and push myself is a sense that I have to I don't know how I can explain it more than that so let's end this episode I had no answers I only had observations and I had my adaptability so that's what I had you know learned in this this time that I was in the hospital and aftermath and where I'm at now so my message critical thinking isn't just something we talk about it's something we live we can use it in practical ways so the reality I'm still navigating with it I'm still learning I'm still trying to adapt every single day that I slowly get better is another day that I get back to normalcy but I have to focus on what's real of immediate health concerns concerns to those that are just you know inconveniences so headaches I can you know take time not look at the screen too long take breaks not get stressed out about other things even though that's gonna be a little difficult but here's the final question let me ask

Control, Stress, Recovery, And Meaning

SPEAKER_00 32:40

you guys a question when life doesn't give you answers how do you decide what to do next let's have you think about that with your critical thinking skills and your experiences so if you've been following along you know this podcast is about understanding the world and sometimes that starts with understanding ourselves if this episode made you think take a moment to reflect on how you approach uncertainty in your own life and if you're getting value from these conversations continue to support the podcast share it come back for the next episode and stay part of the process because it isn't just about answers it's about learning how to think so with that being with that being said I want to thank the people that helped me even though many of them are not listening to the podcast and they're aware of it. Some of them are aware but I do appreciate the prayers and the support that you guys gave me the few phone calls I got the text message two or three of them I do want to say thank you for that and I do appreciate your support this episode was a little more close to home and I was really debating if I should even do it. I mean most podcasts don't go more than four or five but you know as of right now this podcast is hitting a lot of things and a lot of traction my goal right now is to hit a total by the end of the year a thousand downloads as of now we have 247 downloads exactly and I have exactly 17 countries and 55 cities worldwide I will read you the countries now the United States Japan Vietnam Colombia Russia Federation Argentina Germany Kenya Iraq Hungary Mexico Ubekistan United Kingdom Italy South Korea Angolia Chile there are people may have just may have found out this podcast by accident but the ones who came back to listen to two or three and now listen to them weekly thank you for listening share it with somebody listen from an indigenous perspective that Native Americans are still here that you know I'm one of the few ones that are trying to talk about my perspective my reality my through my eyes to how I see things and that's what Mundo Perspective is about. So again share it with somebody tell people about it thousand by the end of this year hopefully we can get to a thousand downloads and hopefully you guys are enjoying this click on the link and support it by sending your monthly contribution because as of now that's all I'm counting on to continue doing this because besides having a creative outlet I would like to see this grow into something more tangible where I can do this anywhere. And right now that's where it's looking at because with this platform with this type of audience I think we can change people's perspective on seeing things from a different view understanding the world from a different view. Anyway I hope you guys enjoyed this special episode number 13 lucky 13 with that being said make sure you create yourself a great day give the person you know that you care about

Closing Question And Support The Show

SPEAKER_00 36:55

a hug be appreciative of things be appreciative of your life be appreciative for things that you don't think that are you know benefiting you now because everything in your life does have meaning and you have meaning and with that being said have a great day thanks for stopping by