What is it - live with the syndrome of Alice in Wonderland

Rik Hemsley, programmer, 36 years old:

"When it happened the first time, I was a 21-year-old student. On the eve of a long time I have not slept, I drank a lot of coffee and writing coursework, but felt fine. And then I stood up, leaned over the remote control, and my feet seemed to have gone into the floor. Looking down, I saw that my foot sunk into the carpet - an unpleasant feeling, but it lasted only a few seconds. Soon I found myself in more serious violations space. Floor beneath me or walked the waves, or caved in, and when I tried to go, it seemed to me that I hobble on the lips. If I'm lying on the bed, staring at his hands, the fingers stretched half a mile ahead. These strange experiences began to happen more often, but I did not pay attention to them, believing that this is due to stress, poor sleep or food.

I graduated from school and got a job by the system administrator, but instead of disappearing, my symptoms worsened. Now everything was distorted, and the time. As I walked along the road, standing on the sidelines of the machine looked like a toy, and I myself seemed disproportionately high. At work, my chair looks great, and I myself in it as if squeezed.

"Fisheye" - the lens through which I am now looking at the world - greatly complicates my everyday life. Not being able to accurately estimate the distance, I moved awkwardly or too cautious. Soon out on the street began to demand a lot of effort; I hardly knew any of the surface going, so had a hard time walking. If I did not think about their feelings, everything was fine, but as soon as remembered, then began to fall. To cross the road was dangerous, I had no idea of ​​the size of the approaching car and how far away I was. It was then that I firmly thought: what is wrong with me? The attending physician assured me that from the point of view of the psyche with me all right, and the whole thing into a migraine. But painkillers failed, and the magnetic scan did not show anything. Since the work I was not able to, then moved back to his parents. And they, I accidentally caught the end of the TV show, in which one woman complained of symptoms like mine. Since I first learned about the syndrome of Alice in Wonderland. I began to hope for a cure, but neither my therapist or a neurologist could not find the description of the disease. They said that I have to learn to live with it.

For a while I did not go out to the street, living on savings, again I began to work in a couple of years - from the house. This gave some income, but most of the last ten years, I could not live the way I wanted. I like to go somewhere, hang out with friends and relax, but outside the house, I felt more suffering than pleasure. I was afraid that the sight of all Shut mid-sentence, overwhelmed by the changes that have taken place in the surrounding world.

I'm 36 now, and fortunately now I experience spatial distortion only once a month. I have not driven a car, but I have a job and a girlfriend, with whom we bought the house. The reasons for his condition, I did not understand, but now I can lead a relatively normal life - so I was able to take it. Undoubtedly, this syndrome is associated with infinite difficulties, but something in it I even like it sometimes, especially after I wake up, I have a special binocular vision. Lying on the bed, I look out the window at the crows, a hundred meters away from me, circling above the trees, but the details can see every bird and every top of the tree, as if they are at arm's length. It seems that this side effect gradually disappears, and I was already almost is not enough. "