The Biggest Challenge
Having spoken with many groups since my first time being blessed with the opportunity to join KBIC’s Community Education group shortly after becoming a KBIC member in 2008, I’ve been asked a variation of “What’s the hardest part of living with a brain injury?” countless times. An indication that my impaired memory is the answer may just be that I can’t exactly recall my most frequent answer! Excuse my deflecting from a difficult topic with a perhaps unsuccessful attempt at humor…
While my answer undoubtably depended on the stage of my recovery I was in at the moment asked, let me give a bulleted short synopsis from each time period:
First year- Without any concept of the severity/permanence of brain injury symptoms psychological distress hadn’t set in, the complete loss of function in my left side extremities was debilitating. Fortunately, amazing family support and rehab services kept me moving forward and dampened the complete loss of functioning.
Next 5 or so years- As I regained some independence and started to live a more independent life, my cognitive and emotional struggles became extremely evident. Acceptance is an ongoing challenge, but depression was particularly acute during this time as the struggles of living with reduced abilities and capacity were shocking.
Years 6-10- With progress in recovery becoming less dramatic, the delusion of being “back to normal” faded. Problems/addictive behavior, both new and preexisting the TBI reemerged.
Post 2016- Heartbreak, loss of loved ones, increased demands on time/energy, the Pandemic, realizing that I’m still a fallible and imperfect human being…
Well, that was quite revealing! As I look over my concise summary of the quandaries of each period of my post brain injury life, it strikes me that with recovery came the appearance of struggles that seem to be universal to life as a human being in our world today. In fact, I would guess that most people around my age have similar lists from the past decade. Obviously, in the immediate period after my crash it was a triage like existence that gradually morphed to being fortunate to have my existence dedicated to rehabilitation. I was extremely blessed to have family and friends step up and give support, particularly as I transitioned to my post collegiate life to what traditionally would be an independent adult, but obviously was quite different.
The puzzling thing about this period of recovery where I attempt to settle in to a new normal of functioning while attempting to bring the best version of myself to the world as I can is that I miss having a reason to be struggling or definitive challenge to overcome. Please don’t misunderstand this statement as a desire to go back and live those grueling years as a recent brain injury survivor; just that holding on to the myth that I was only struggling due to the injury was somewhat comforting. That misguided thinking provided the hope that all would be smooth sailing upon reaching a certain level of physical and cognitive functioning.
That’s not to say that I’ve definitively plateaued as far as improvement or stopped working to improve. Just like any living person, I can adapt, continue to learn, and function more skillfully regardless of how long it’s been since my brain injury. Rather, the trouble is that I seem to be stuck in a pattern of creating difficulty, or to put it in more common language: Self Sabotaging to create identifiable barriers rather than living with humility.
I’d love to close this post with a solution or newly realized strategy to modify this destructive pattern which has negatively affected my world and unfortunately relationships. But perhaps the real answer is that life is to be lived fully rather than approached as a problem to be solved. There’s no need to manifest struggle just to have a problem or behavior that I can point to as the reason for my difficulty. In fact, like any human being, all I can do is the best I can on any given day!