Auggie Rants

Weekend getaway from Bombay, one our favourite places where we would go at least once a year if not more often, following is the picture story of one of the things you could do when you were there..

Its a hot summer day, the sun shines through the trees..

a group of people sit patiently in the shade of a few trees...

waiting for the right wind speed and a bunch of other factors..

finally when all factors are right

the first batch of beginners walk to the base...

and the practice of controlling begins..

while the rest of the gang looks on...

while the first person warms up a few others also begin...

the sun continues to stream through...

A strong wind and the control gets difficult...

the trainer helps the student showing how to gain control over it...

and while most if the beginners struggle.. there was a stand alone success...

some almost taking off the ground...

with good control and balance..

its time to take off...

with the last few finishing off their practices..

its time to climb to a higher spot..

up on the mountain the parameters are tested again...

and after its all good...

its time to jump off the mountain...

as the wind takes them higher..

and higher...

and further up..

its time to return to the mountain..

and complete the first solo journey for the day..

only to take off once again...

this time with a passenger along...

and thats called tandem flying...

its when a non flyer gets strapped on while the expert takes off..

of course after the passenger has been given a few instructions..

they are given a experience which will last them for a life time..

some of the students as well. who have now completed their training...

take off on their first solo flights..

as their week long training has finally borne some fruit...

and leaves them on a high...

and as the day comes to an end...

and the sun sets on the horizon...

its time for all to say... "I Believe I Can Fly"

for those who want to learn how to paraglide, or just want to take a trip up can check out the FB group Nirvana - Paragliding India, They are located at Kamshet which is a few hours drive from Mumbai & Pune..

Nirvana Adventures has finally got its well-deserved Official NOTAM for conducting parpgliding operations at Kamshet on 4th April 2013, One more first for Nirvana Adventures the leading paragliding School in India!

For more details look up their website Fly Nirvana

For more interesting articles click on INDEX to see the list, and to be in touch hit Like / Follow on the blog button on the right hand side or hit Like on the Facebook page Auggielicious for information, latest news and events beyond the blog..

For most people who know me, didn’t know that I had something what is know as the Bell’s Palsy at the beginning of 2012. I didn’t let too many people know about it, but now I thought that I should share what happened to me just in case it benefits someone. The things I did may not be ideal to all but just knowing what I went through might help someone in case they come across something similar.

It started on the 29^th of Jan 2012 where I lost taste completely, without having eaten something spicy or burning my tongue. Everything I ate just felt bland and like most people I ignored it expecting it to go away. The next day at around 5:30 pm it struck me that my right eye was not blinking, I was working on the laptop and watching tv the entire day so I just ignored it thinking that I had not blinked for long and that's whats causing this. Went to play tennis at 7pm and as time passed, the right side of my face felt numb and slowly even control of my speech was beginning to feel funny. The right side of the lip had started to feel a bit heavy, and I was having a bit of problem having a normal conversation, again I ignored it assuming that this would go away in a bit. Came back and post a shower the entire right side of my face was feeling heavy by now, it was a strange feeling. Personally I never bother to do anything about illness until its absolutely necessary for me to do it. My wife who was out of town returned from her work travel that night by 9:30 pm and had it not been for a client who insisted for a meeting the next day, she was not meant to return till 2 days later, it was God sent as I would have slept off the signs assuming that it would go away the next day.

So when she got home and I told her my face felt funny and one look at me she knew something was wrong, so I called my family doctor who on hearing the symptoms immediately diagnosed it as Bell's Palsy and he asked me to immediately rush to the nearest hospital and get it treated, not to wait for even a few more hours and let him know as soon as it got done. Still not satisfied as we had not heard of something like this, we called another doctor friend who runs a service called "doctor on call" he as well suggested that we immediately go to a hospital, so we left and went to the nearest hospital which was Kokilaben Dhirubhai Ambani Hospital to reach the hospital by 10:15 pm. After doing a few basic tests like blood, and pressure they tested my nervous system by asking me if I could feel sensation at various parts, like on the hands, feet, on both sides of the face etc. So it was confirmed that I had only lost sensation on only the right side of my face. The attending spoke to the neurologist over the phone and confirmed that it was indeed Bell's Palsy by this time it was around 11:15pm. An emergency case of someone with a heart condition arrived and the entire team present disappeared attending to that patient, by the time they got out it was past 12 in the night.

Once they got out of the emergency, the nurse came running and almost in panic started preparing what looked like a injection, I stopped her and asked her what it was before she broke off the seal, told me it was a steroid injection, which would be like a small plastic like capsule in size, to be injected straight into the veins and would then slowly dissolve into the system. My gut feeling was that I don't want to be injected with it, (I am not afraid of needles) now the mass opinion here is that you should get a steroid injection to get cured quicker, but at the same time people say that the steroid could have side effects. I asked if there was a option of oral medication, after consulting the neurologist a list of medicines were prescribed. Next they asked me to get admitted till at least the next morning when neurologist would visit the hospital, they said need to keep a eye on the patient to make sure that it does not spread to the other parts of the body as it could case permanent paralysis. I refused to get admitted what so ever, firstly I hate hospitals so I would not be able to sleep at all, secondly it was 1 am by now, I don't think any hospital staff is going to keep that much of a eye on me till morning and my feeling was, this was just to fill up the hospital beds.

So we had to sign papers which said that the patient has check out against medical advice and if anything was to happen it was not the hospitals responsibility. So back at home, my wife set alarms for every hour to wake up and check on me, the signs told was to check for drooling and then numbness on the hand and if so to rush back immediately. Nothing like that happened and in the morning we went back to meet the neurologist who did all the checks once again, fully confirmed that it was indeed Bell's Palsy and along with medication also suggested we visit the physiotherapy department who would give me some face exercises to be done as well some electric shock therapy to stimulate the nerves.

On checking with the doctor and google search telles you that Bell's Palsy could happen to anyone of any age and needs to be treated as soon as it is detected (ideally less than 12 hours since it starts) as longer you take for treatment to begin the longer it might take for you heal, also treatment prevents it from spreading through your body. The general indications of what causes this, is usually if the person has a ear infection or has had a viral fever in the last few days, what happens in this case is that there is inflammation around the nerve which is behind the ear, this causes the nerve to loose its control over half the face. (face is controlled by 2 main nerves behind each ear which then breakup and go onto control the muscles like eyebrows, eyelids etc) In case its a ear infection or a viral that is causing it, its easier to treat as you take away this infection and normalcy should return. In my case there was no sign or symptoms of ear infection or even a viral not had one for a long time before this, so my case was amongst rare ones, not completely unheard of but rare indeed.

So from the next day physiotherapy timing was assigned, started with me sitting in front of the mirror and exercises for the face was shown like
1. Close your mouth and try to hold air in your mouth without letting air out by not letting the lips part, initial few days use the hand to support closing the mouth completely.
2. Try to whistle by blowing out, again use fingers to help.
3. Try and raise the eyebrows use fingers to push the right one, it up till it can go back up by itself.
4. Try a big smile and use your finger to push the right side up.
5. Slowly close your eyelids jamming them shut, again use the support of the hand to close the right eyelid.
each of these exercises had to be done 15 - 20 times in a session and to do these exercises 2 to 3 times each day or even more if I could handle it. Then came the electric shock treatment, now what is supposed to happen is that they take 2 electrodes and they place it on your face and give you mild pulses which are supposed to stimulate the nerves, now while one is fixed the other is moved around to find the various nerves points that control your face muscles, once found they keep it there for a bit, while u count it pulsating for like 20 pulses, I don't know if this happens often but out of the 5 days that I went for this 3 times I got a shock from this instrument and not a mild one trust me. Its when the guy finishes with one nerve and moves to the next is when I got these jolts, it could be because he did not turn the voltage down all the way to nil or if he lifted the electrode while the current was still passing even if for a minor second. After the 3rd time I received this shock I decided to discontinue this, also parallelly a relative found out from doctors abroad that while this treatment could kick start your nerves it could do some damage to your nerve ends which would be felt only later in life.

(Pic - 1) That me keeping a straight face

(Pic - 2) That's me trying to smile

So while the face was ok for the first few days by the 4th day it had got really bad, the face was really drooping and talking was now a big problem, most people could not tell that something was wrong with me as long as I kept a straight face (see pic 1 above) but if you look closely you will see that the muscles on right side is drooping. Also as long as I did not attempt to talk, no one could tell. Every time I spoke the sound was not totally right as lack of lip control and there were blows of air from the lips like with words that had P or B in the start, and more than other people noticing I was more conscience of what I was trying to say, as I knew that it was not clear to me. I clicked a few pictures of myself back then, in the second image that's me trying to smile using all the face muscles and not me trying to pull a face, as you can see the right side was affected in my case - eye lid, eye brow, the forehead muscle, the cheek, lip refused to move. The eye lid initially had to be forced to shut and I had to use a sleep mask (eye cover) so that it would force shut.

As luck also would have it a project came along, now doctors had advised that as far as possible avoid going out and just relax for a few days, but work was not easy to come by and this was a interesting project, I had to shoot a video for an idea, for this an INKPAD that was custom designed to get adults who were illiterate excited and to get them to sign up for their education program, this was run by a NGO called Door Step School, of course it had to be shot in the slums and of course I still went ahead and did it, this video went on to win multiple awards across the globe including a SILVER at Cannes Lions International Festival of Creativity, a BRONZE Epica Awards, Adfest (Bkk). It was a strange feeling at the shoot because only after a while of shoot did I inform the crew of what I had, most of the people were working with me the first time so didn't know that there was anything wrong with me. I had to keep sunglasses on at all times, since my eyelid would not shut and there was the risk of something going into your eye and causing permanent damage. I was carrying eye drops and had to put it every few hours.

Then my wife also took me for ayurvedic treatment, here the doctor told me to continue with the existing treatment and added his set of medicines as well, so mornings would begin with some medicine that was to be had 30 min's before breakfast followed by a nasal spray with steaming (it was horrible smelling) then a face massage with some oil that was given, then some other tablet just before breakfast and a whole bunch of tables post breakfast, then rest of the day also there were pills to be had before and after meals along with the physiotherapy that I had to do at least 3 times a day. I did do them as many times as I could do it.

Final result was that my face was 98% back to normal in less than 15 days while most doctors and even google tells you that this takes around a month to even a few more to go to normal, I was lucky to have got treatment on time and thank God for a speedy recovery. I wrote about this so that in case someone does end up with a similar situation they may be at least be aware of what someone has gone through, and that might help them.

For more interesting articles click on INDEX to see the list, and to be in touch hit Like / Follow on the blog button on the right hand side or hit Like on the Facebook page Auggielicious for information, latest news and events beyond the blog..