Coffee and Palsy - Day One

First of all "Bear's Palsy", pathologically speaking, is Bell's Palsy. My nickname is "Bear" so I took some creative liberties with my particular diagnosis. Please do not contact your physician and refer to "Bear's Palsy;" at least not until my blog is published in a reputable medical journal.

This blog will give you an interesting and, hopefully, spiritually uplifting perspective of one person's experience with Bell's Palsy.

I was diagnosed with Bell's Palsy on Monday, August 24th, 2009.

That particular Monday was indistinguishable from so many I've had before. The first sign of any problem was when I was rinsing the suds from my hair. As I ruffled my hair to root out any stow-away shampoo, I got a face full of soapy water that immediately had me staring at the floor and feverishly blinking while rinsing my right eye. This wasn't the first time I've maced myself with Sunsilk (the fiance let's me use the good stuff), but it was definitely the most intense in memory.

Preparation progressed and I finally became conscious and minutely concerned when I noticed that the right side of my tongue was slightly numb on the surface when I brushed my teeth. I remember thinking it was weird that the surface of my tongue couldn't feel the bristles as I brushed, but could feel the pressure deep within the tongue. My mind flashed the possibility of a stroke, but laughed it off due to my age and the fact that it was just my tongue at this point.

After getting dressed, I headed out to meet my mom for lunch. I noticed my smile beginning to bias to the left. My right side wasn't puling it's weight when I wanted to blast someone with my pearly-whites. I had made mention that my face seemed a bit numb on one side and then mom sprung into action. In a single motion she comforted me, spit on her thumb and tried to wipe the numbness away (I kid), and began dialing the number to my physician. I had an appointment that afternoon.

As I awaited my appointment, I took the time to let my fiance know what was going on. Naturally, she was extremely concerned. I told her I would keep her posted and headed to google. I threw "facial paralysis" into a search field and was surprised to learn that Bell's Palsy, a term I've head numerous time without any real context, was likely to be the culprit of my facial laziness.

Throughout all of this, I remained quite optimistic and even was able to joke with family and friends that I "got the palsy." I am a joker by nature and very extroverted, so I had no impedance with confronting this problem with jokes and smiles (albeit half-smiles,) initially. I had no clue that I was about to crash emotionally the next day.

I met with the PA that afternoon who confirmed the news that Drs. Google and Wikipedia had already broken to me ever so coldly earlier in the day. The Physician's Assistant and I were able to kid and talk candidly about what was going on. She created a friend-like report. She prescribed steroids and an antiviral (a popular cocktail from what I've read so far) giggled at me a bit (it was provoked) and sent me on my way. Before releasing me, she brought me a data sheet on Bell's Palsy. She was a cool doc and waived her hand over most of the sheet and said "blah, blah, blah." She came to a pause and rested her index finger on the part of the data sheet that mentions possible complications. She pointed to the bullet point that said "Emotional Distress" and made a sarcastic "boo-hoo" gesture. I picked up on her cue and began laughing at the thought of me, mr. smiley funny guy, being effected emotionally by this....after all, it's temporary...