Musings of a survivor: Well, I just signed up... - Headway

Headway

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Musings of a survivor

fuzzyhead profile image
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Well, I just signed up tonight and I already have a lot to think about from reading blog posts so far. I first heard about Headway about nine years ago, and that was 11 or 12 years after I sustained my TBI in a road accident.

Up until then I hadn't really understood the implications of having a head injury - I didn't understand why my social interactions rarely got the result I wanted though, and it had started to bother me.

Then I read a leaflet about headway, phoned up for some information and boy, when I received it, it was like a weight was lifted off my shoulders! Everything that had been bothering me, social interactions, emotional lability, depression...it was all explained and I felt like SOMEONE understood. The only problem was, folk around me were oblivious to it, and didn't seem to want to understand.

Ever since, it's been a constant struggle to balance the knowledge of why I am the way I am in certain ways (I choose how I am in other ways, I do know that). I went to see a neuropsychologist who, well-meaning though he was, didn't help...I went to see him to identify what strengths and weaknesses I now had, but he told me I could do whatever I wanted to do...he totally missed the point of why I was there, which is surprising given how many TBI survivors he must have come across.

I was there to separate out stuff I had influence over (me) and stuff I didn't (the injured parts of my brain). But I remain in the dark to a certain degree. I'm happy with my life, I have my own family now and a reasonably keen intellect, which I know puts me in the very lucky category of TBI survivors, especially considering the state of me immediately following the accident. So I hope I don't come across as ungrateful. I just want to understand myself a little bit, and hope if I can it will make me a little kinder to myself (and, therefore, others)

I hope people feel at liberty to comment and discuss. I really think this is an excellent community website...the problem being that if all head injury victims are as socially clueless as me, there may not be much discussion...

Well anyway, this blog post is what it is. I will try to continue to muse if people respond well to what I say.

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fuzzyhead
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lizzybizzy profile image
lizzybizzy

Thanks for this really honest post! I'll tell my son about the community, he didn't have his injury long ago but think he'd find posts like this really helpful :-)

wirralt profile image
wirralt

i find its just really nice to talk to people who may have some kind of a clue as to how confused,scared and sometimes totaly lost i feel , i have more good days than bad at the moment but when the bad days come im a different very scared sad woman who can come across as very panic struck xl

fuzzyhead profile image
fuzzyhead

Definitely agree with that sentiment, wirralt...people who haven't experienced it from one side or another can't really understand, even if they are kind and accepting, as they have no frame of reference. I keep telling myself to go along to a group but always find more important things to do (I recommended it to a friend of my mom's and she - the friend - really loves them now).

It must be tough for family and carers too - my mom had to adjust to a totally different me, I wasn't touchy feely at all before it happened but I became very tactile for a few years (I suppose that's the good side, the bad side being the moods, my sudden reliance on people around me for absolutely everything I needed, etc, etc).

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