Yesterday morning, I lost three hours of awareness. I thought I was sleeping. I have a vague recollection of what I was doing. From my viewpoint, I was dreaming. But I was talking and walking all over the house. I only have fragments of what my husband was telling me. I have nothing at all from what one of my sons was telling me, and I don’t remember eating a breakfast bar (an unhealthy one I would never eat under any other circumstance because I am trying to take care of my body). What I remember is waking up at 5am, thinking I was unusually tired but had to get up, so I took care of my eyes with the damp warm cloth (because I have dry eye).

After that, the dreams started for me. It was like I was primarily in a dream but there was the outside voice of my husband that wasn’t getting through. I was saying all kinds of stuff that had to do with the dreams. The outside voice coming from my husband made no sense, and I kept saying, “What?” I was also saying, “Jesus Christ is Lord” and “my dad had schizophrenia” over and over. Then I was intermittently crying and laughing. I was pacing around the bedroom. I have no memory of this. I only remember snippets of my husband saying, “You have a mammogram tomorrow.” “You don’t talk to her anymore.” “We’ve been married for 25 years, do you remember that?” Apparently, I even forgot I had children. Then he left for work and asked one of my sons to watch over me. He said I was just sitting in the chair when he left with my eyes open. I was just staring off into space when he had to leave.

I don’t remember coming down the stairs. I do remember seeing my son in the living room chair and him asking me if I wanted to go for a walk. We will go on our 3-5 mile walks a couple times a week. I said yes, and I remember thinking exercise would help me. My son said from there, I spent 45 minutes walking from the kitchen to the living room to the laundry room and back. And I even ate that breakfast bar. At this point everything is a complete blank. I wasn’t in “dream mode” like I was upstairs. Apparently, I kept asking about the library books I got on Saturday. He eventually hid them because I was fixated on them. I was also telling him, “my dad had schizophrenia” over and over, too. All I remember is coming down at 9:00am, agreeing to the walk, and getting in the car. But the clock in living room did say 9:00am, and the car said 9:45am when I got in. So I know I lost time. The walk did help, but I don’t remember getting down there, and I don’t remember half of the walk. Things came into “focus” at the halfway point, and from that point on, I was fully engaged and aware of everything going on around me. I did cry on and off throughout the day because this episode scared me. I had trouble sleeping last night because I worried I’d wake up like that again.

I just had a physical two weeks ago, and I’m due to go in on December 3 for a follow up for more blood work on my white blood count. I am going to tell my doctor about this (and any other episodes) I have. My dad did have schizophrenia, and I remember my mom saying he was doing similar stuff. This was before I was old enough to remember it. He was resistant to getting help, but back then, you could make someone get treatment if they needed it. Now you can only make someone get treatment if they are a threat to themselves or others. I’m glad I wasn’t a threat to anyone. But I am also willing to go in to get tested. I guess having a degree in Psychology has paid off after all. I know that getting help does not mean someone is stupid or that someone is a loser. I am aware that Psychology is one of those fields that still has some stigma attached to it, though it’s not as bad as it used to be. My dad was able to have a normal and productive life because my mom caught what was going on and he took the right medicine. The sooner you can catch this, the better. I want to get help if I need it, but in order to figure out what’s going on, I’ll need to have the proper tests done.

I’ve watched my mom go through a lung and heart transplant, which her body rejected, when she was 48. I watched my dad deal with schizophrenia and emphysema. He died from the emphysema. I saw him with the breath thing they use (sorry, I don’t remember the term for the machine) and the oxygen tank he needed. I promised myself I would do everything possible to take care of my health so that I never ended up like that. I can think of plenty of other places I’d rather be than a hospital. Now I’ll have to address the mental side of things. It’s possible there is a physical explanation for what happened yesterday. Or maybe it will be mental issue. Whatever it is, I will go with the doctors’ advice. So I’m optimistic about the path forward.

In the meantime, I am going to start teaching Eric (the son who said he would take over my books when I can no longer do it) the ins and outs of what I do with these books. I will consult an intellectual property lawyer about handing over copyright of my books to him so that he can prove to Amazon, Google, Draft2Digital, etc that he has full rights to them. I’ll also arrange for him to be on my business account for finances so he can get the money. I figure since he’ll run the business, he should get the benefit from it. No one else is interested, and it’s not like I’m making a lot of money so no one in the house is arguing over “their share”. I finally did set up investments last year and arranged for everyone to be taken care of when I can no longer do it myself. I’m going to have a power of attorney set up with my husband so he can handle things for me just in case I am unable to make decisions.

I know all of that sounds extreme. People have told me I’m morbid. But I want to make sure my loved ones are taken care of, and I want to be able to do all of this while I’m able to mentally do so. Maybe this was a fluke. Maybe I’ll be fine from here on out. I don’t know what the future will bring. I’d just rather be proactive. I’ve watched too many people die and leave their loved ones in a state of confusion. My dad was proactive, and that made everything easier to deal with. I had been prepared for his death. When he got emphysema, we knew he didn’t have a long time left. We had the time to grieve in advance. My mom was a bigger shock, but given how bad her lungs were, we knew we might have to grieve her, too, and we did in the year it took for the transplant to happen. When the call came that she died, I already knew she was no longer alive. No one calls before the sun rises to give you good news. Death is morbid, but it’s also a reality. I would rather have my family missing “me” than wondering what investment accounts I have or what to do with my books because they never ran a business.

I’ll keep you updated on what happens. I figure this is going to take some time to figure out. In the meantime, I’ll keep on watching my health the best I can and write more books since I still love writing them.