Life is a Slot Machine
Living with Ménière’s Disease  2013-2022


Meniere's is a debilitating chronic condition, charaterized by an irreversible loss of hearing, tinnitus, vertigo attacks that can throw you on the floor, and multiple physical and cognitive side manifestations of variable intensity . The vertigo crisis may happen in series, triggered by many possible factors (light, noise, warmth etc..). But their unpredictibility, and the fact that even familiar environments become aggressive, generate a recurring anxiety, and impose radical changes in the way of life. The anxiety is amplified by the absence of perspectives as there is no known cure nor effective medicine, and by the fact that no one really understands what’s going for you. 

With Menière, everything is uncertain. Life becomes subject to vagaries, Life is a Slot Machine. 
Depression,  social isolation and a high sense of aloness are common consequences of the disease. As for any chronic illnesses, one has to navigate through a complex loss and grieving process: the loss of physical integrity, of autonomy, an identity and a life narrative to rebuild,  etc.
It started for me one night in 2013, with no warning. Since then, I have had to find my own way, cope with the situation, and reinvent myself to continue working, travelling, generating revenues to raise my family, and run an acceptable social life.
Photography has helped me in several ways. Firstly, to be on the move again and recover a decent physical condition; also to find healing and regain self-confidence, by creating something, by being able to focus on an objective, and by enjoying an activity. 
Importantly, practicing photography has helped me to grow self-consciousness, understand that there was a before and an after, as I could not make it in the same way, it was too demanding. By analogy, I had to learn how to reset my daily activities physically, mentally, emotionally, and socially, and to build protections, new norms and routines. 

In this project, the photos illustrate the five stronger crisis I have endured since 2013. I made them as soon as I could stand up, or by coincidence a few days just before the episode. They were taken in my immediate environment, some of them during overseas business trips, when the crisis occured. Associating them paints a pattern depicting the evolution of my relation to the disease, from Ignorance, through Sideration, Denial, Depression, and more recently towards a relative step of Acceptance. This extended view over time objectifies and deconstructs the complexity of the situation, and helps me create a narrative I can more easily share with others, and importantly, with myself.

Lastly, if we follow Minor  White’s viewpoint according to which “every photogaph is a self-portait”, the images contribute to consolidating my identity, and for you, to better capture who I am, behind the deceptive mask of this otherwise invisible ordeal.