In retrospect, I'm pretty sure Parkinson's Disease had sporadically announced it's arrival. I'm guessing most everybody has experienced that dizziness that happens when standing up too fast, and that subsides very quickly. It's most likely due to orthostatic hypertension...a sudden drop in blood pressure.
Our two girls and I were going to the airport to wait for my wife to return from her two week reserve duty with the army in Colorado. Once at the airport and before walking to the "waiting area," I got myself some coffee at the airport Starbucks. We were almost to the waiting area when I started feeling dizzy.
Rather than subsiding, the dizziness feeling started increasing in intensity. I started feeling unstable on my feet so I stopped walking and leaned with my back on the nearest wall. Then my coffee slipped through my hands and fell. And then I had to crouch down to hopefully keep from passing out. That was the first time something like that had happened.
One day I decided I would ride my bicycle to the Mapco gas station. We live in a relatively remote area, and at somewhere around 15 miles, that was the closest place. I bought some Gatorade and a candy bar and went outside. That dizziness feeling started big time, so I crouched down and leaned against the building. Next thing I know, I'm waking up and a pretty girl was asking me if I was alright.
When I thought the dizziness episode had run its course, I got on the bike intending to go home. Or at least I tried to. I couldn't maintain my balance and kept almost falling. Once I was finally able to get on the bike, I couldn't ride without almost falling. I was eventually able to ride, but my mind and vision both felt out of whack.
Same thing happened while the family and I were waiting for our reservation to be available at a restaurant. The family waited around the car a ways away in the parking lot while I went to check on our reservation. When I got to the door of the restaurant, same thing...dizzy, crouched down, pretty girl asking me if I was alright.
The third--and hopefully last time it happened was at Home Depot. I was loading about 30 bags of concrete on my equipment trailer with the help of a couple of guys that worked there. As with the other two times, the sequence of events happened exactly the same, with the exception that instead of a pretty girl it was a not really ugly dude asking if I was alright.
The other guy helping then pointed to the .45 Smith and Wesson M&P that had fallen out of my crappy in-the-waistband holster and said "you might want that." Now every time that dude sees me at Home Depot, he follows me around.
That hasn't happened again since then. Hopefully it won't, but if it does, I hope it's not at Home Depot with the not so ugly dude hovering over me.
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