This week was a milestone - I began driving again on April 23rd. It wasn't 100% for sure and I took it very very carefully. It was tough backing up as that maneuver requires a lot of head motion as does looking both ways at intersections. Maybe I started a bit too soon but I believe that forcing it a little went a long way towards improving the latent dizziness and balance problems. It also gave me relief that I was becoming independent once again and that I was really going to recover from this. I still had dizziness and balance problems and some taste problems. My Bell's Palsy was getting better and I could smile and almost wink my left eye again. My energy was being slowly restored. I couldn't hold a full pucker with my mouth at this point though. I continued to take Phenergan for my nausea and it works very well with no noticeable side effects.

Back to work and back to running. I started slowly but after a few days resumed my 4 a week workouts of running 5k's. It felt good to be able to run again. Running still seems a bit unreal as I am conscious of my balance problems when I run or when I walk for that matter. I took up bike riding again although at first it was very comical. If I turned to look back for a car I would run into the curb or my wife's bike or whatever was there. I didn't crash but had some near misses. Good time to be wearing a helmet. After a few weeks bike riding was pretty much back to normal. At this time I also started vestibular (balance) rehabilitation. On the first visit they do a series of tests to determine your balance condition on each side of your body. They induce vertigo by blowing air into your ear for a certain amount of time. It works very well. I had severe vertigo twice by the test in my right ear (meaning the right side is functioning properly) and virtually no effect on the left side where my balance nerve had been affected by the RH virus. After this they attempt to improve your balance by giving you exercises to do each day. Exercises to lesson nystagmus (involuntary eye movement) and also to stimulate your balance system to make up for the lack of balance on the affected side. In reality, you are training your brain to compensate using the balance nerve on the good side, both of your eyes and your feet. It was worth it and I did notice significant improvement.