Kyle Russell

On April 12, 2025, I woke up and walked down my hallway, slightly swaying to the left. I remember thinking I must not have slept well. By the time I reached the bottom of our hardwood stairs, I was grabbing for the railing, bracing myself against the wall. In the kitchen, I spilled milk while pouring coffee. In the bathroom, the grout lines on the tile began rotating clockwise, resetting, and spinning again. I laughed at first. Then I went back to bed.

Something was off, and it was no longer funny.

The spinning did not stop. It intensified. Standing up felt unpredictable. The room moved. Light felt harsher. Sound felt louder. I began to feel like I was half a step behind myself. I would sit at my computer and drift, unsure where I was in the process. I began “task slipping,” losing track mid-thought and asking questions I already knew the answers to.

Flashing lights quickly became one of my biggest triggers. They did not just bother me. They caused me to spin out. My visual system felt hijacked, and once it started, it was hard to regain control.

I no longer watched TV at night or played video games with my kids. I couldn’t handle the flashing and image resetting as the frame refreshed.

By May, I reached the lowest point of my journey.

The 7 to 9 a.m. family routine, something I had done for years without thinking, suddenly took everything I had. Morning light felt disorienting. The normal sounds of my kids getting ready for school were amplified. I was dizzy and forgetful. I felt uncomfortable in my own home. I was not driving at that point, which added another layer of vulnerability. I was genuinely afraid I might make a mistake or hurt someone because my brain felt delayed.

I felt fragile and disoriented. I questioned whether this version of me was permanent.

Soon, I began waking around 4:00 a.m. The house was quiet then. The early darkness felt safer than morning. In that stillness, my brain worked better. I would pre-write emails and schedule them to send later. I would time Slack messages so that my workday felt preloaded before the noise of family life began. I built safety around my mornings because once the light and motion started, my bandwidth disappeared.

The days drained me. By early afternoon, I often had to lie down in a dark room and close my eyes just to recalibrate. It was not a nap. It was recovery.

After multiple appointments, imaging, and testing, I was diagnosed with vestibular neuritis. It explained the dizziness, the fog, the anxiety, and the crushing fatigue. My vestibular nerve had been inflamed. My brain was compensating constantly just to keep me upright.

Recovery was not passive. Vestibular therapy requires exposure. You have to reintroduce discomfort so your brain can relearn what is safe and test it.

One early test was a minor league baseball game.

The first game felt overwhelming. The layered noise, constant movement, crowd energy, and bright visuals felt like too much input from every direction. I remember wanting to crawl into a hole. I stayed, but I was barely holding on inside.

Weeks later, I returned to another game. This time I brought tools. Medication, binaural music through bone-conducting headphones to calm my nervous system without isolating myself, and a hat to narrow my visual field and reduce peripheral chaos. The difference was striking. The environment had not changed. I had.

I realized that having a goal was critical.

A documentary film I helped produce was nominated for a News and Documentary Emmy Award in New York. Earlier in my journal, I had written clearly that flashing lights caused me to spin out. I knew photographers and strobes would be unavoidable. I was nervous about having an episode in public. I worried about losing it in front of others. But I needed something to aim for.

So, I prepared. I managed my sleep. I used my tools. I accepted that discomfort might show up and went anyway. It was not effortless. But I did not spin out. That night became a marker. Not because symptoms disappeared, but because I navigated them.

The biggest challenge came on July 19th while on a shoot in London. A still photography set began firing strobes. The moment the lights started, my system overloaded. The spinning sensation returned fast and strong; all the progress I had made was gone.

Earlier in the journey, that would have ended me. Instead, I stepped away. I took my medication. I put on my headphones. I limited my visual input. I slowed my breathing. I leaned on my support system. I stayed.

That moment in London was not a setback. It was evidence of growth. The trigger was still real. My response was different.

One of the hardest parts of vestibular neuritis was explaining it. I looked fine most of the time. I showed up. I smiled. But internally, everything required more effort. Big open-ended questions like “How are you?” were difficult because they required scanning too many possibilities when my brain was already taxed.

Specific questions helped. Narrow lanes helped. I used hand signals with my family. A flat hand meant I needed a second to finish a thought, please don’t interrupt me. A thumbs down meant I needed a break. And on virtual calls, if I had a hoodie up or a hat on, that was a signal to my colleagues that I was navigating an episode and needed some patience.

Today, I am out of the acute phase and into recovery. The vertigo is gone. I still manage fatigue, visual strain, and occasional overstimulation.

Vestibular neuritis disrupted my balance. It made flashing lights feel threatening. It made my own home feel overwhelming. It tested all the relationships in my life.

It also taught me to notice patterns and to be patient.

To protect sleep.

To build tools.

To pace exposure.

To set goals that pulled me forward.

The world felt unstable for months, but I finally feel ok about it.