Sunday, 9 August 2009

What Did My TBI Feel Like? Cloudy!

My Dad recently reminded me of the way I described my TBI not long after I received it! For me, my TBI basically made me feel all cloudy. I'm lying there in a bed in my rehab centre; I'm not in pain, but I'm just trying to take it all in. Yet things are so confusing and my head just feels unable to cut through that confusion.

Of course, I've just been thrown into this new environment. I've got very new limitations - I can't walk, I can't even talk properly - and I've now got a very unfamiliar outlook on where my life's heading. What will my recovery be like? It stands to reason that I'm going to be confused, but my brain just can't seem to get started on making head or tail of it! I find myself in this surreal world where I just can't find my bearings.

Fortunately, things do start to fall into place. They slowly begin to make sense and you get more certainty about where things are headed. The cloud lifts.

Getting clarity on where things were at was the start of looking at/thinking about what needed to be done. So it feels more like I should finish this post by saying, the cloud's lifted, let the Games begin!

Cheers,
Mike

The TBI Fingerprint

My own experiences with brain injury recently led my Mum into joining the Committee of the local brain injury association. One of the other Committee members discussed a good analogy for brain injuries and I thought I'd blog about it here.

The Committee member's analogy was, every brain injury is like a fingerprint. There's stuff in common with other brain injuries, but it's pretty much unique! No two brain injuries will be alike.

That idea might create issues for my readers. If every brain injury's unique, why should I bother reading about recovery ideas from a bloke who's only had one of them? After all, my fingerprint will be different to his.

Another thing is, it might make recoverers feel better or worse that their brain injury was more or less severe than someone else's. However, in Recovery from Any TBI, I say how I think, in terms of effects, there's little that sets any TBI apart. If I meet anyone with a TBI, I can be fairly confident that it's fundamentally changed their life. Every TBI's unique, but that doesn't take away from the effect of any one TBI.

What might be similar between recoverers, though, is attitude! Accordingly, the main goal I have when I blog is to help other recoverers find their own determination to recover!

Cheers,
Mike