Well, waking up at all could be considered a good start. I let the dogs out and went to the bathroom to pee. As I sat down I felt my legs disconect (in my brain) from my hips. I swear it felt neurological. My legs were useless, like long dangling flipper things, completely useless. When I got over the shock and after I finished peeing, I had to use my arms to get my feet under me. Then I had to use my arms to work my way hand over hand from piece of furniture to piece of furniture to get back to bed. Fuck! Dead legs are a real drag. And I mean that literally.
I was concerned, but it was too early to do anything about it, like call my doctor's office. So I grabbed my sleep mask and tried to still the screaming going on in my mind, and eventually went back to sleep for a second or two. Usually the dogs leave me alone until I open the door and let them back in, but not this morning. Roscoe the big yellow lab positioned himself under the window closest to my bed, and Marley positioned herself under the kitchen window . Roscoe whined like a baby and Marley barked nonstop. I gave up after half an hour of trying to ignore them and found that my legs were working again. Whew! I was so scared for a second I had goosebumps.
There were a lot of things going through my mind during the hour or so I lay there with my eyes closed, blacked-out by my sleep mask. I have a friend with MS, so MS was on my mind. I also considered that it was just a reaction to stress, just a momentary blip on the radar screen of my addled mind. I checked gingerly to see if my legs would propel me to the door to let the dogs in. They did. So now I will need to call my doctor's office and check out this new symptom that is the collection of symptoms that could just be a transient hysterical paralysis, or some other non-serious momentary psychosomatic bit of flotsam from the weird constellation of my many little health issues.