Trust Issues...

When your own brain lies to you, it's hard to know who you can trust...

One of the most irritating aspects of Post Concussion Syndrome is that waking up each day is a bit like playing the lottery -- you really don't know how you're going to feel, and you could win big and feel great, or lose, and take a step back. Again, this is not unique to me, it apparently happens until you're fully better. It's very common to take a few steps forward and then take one back, but as a very impatient person, it has been working my last remaining nerves.

Apparently my brain is a bit of a liar. It tells me we're feeling good, and let's me go about my business, but then at the end of the day, it's like, "I'm sorry, I lied, I was sick of being at home, and I really wanted to go to TJ Maxx." And then I am up all night dealing with the pain, dizziness, etc. as my brain does its best to shake off the overload and the next day is a bit of a disaster. The best way I can describe it is you feel like you've literally short-circuited.

So who can you trust when you can't trust yourself?

I'm someone who has two speeds -- warp and completely at rest. I have always been that way. And clearly my brain hasn't learned that we need to find that precious middle ground. To me this place is a mystery and I'd probably sooner recognize Bigfoot riding in on a unicorn than I could identify and live within that space of balance.

How do you find it a 24/7 world? I think there's an epidemic of people who don't know their limits, people living at an unhealthy pace with priorities that are totally out of whack.

People like me.

I know for me one thing I realized with this accident is that the center of my world is work. It's a constant. I see the people I work with more than anyone else in my life. So one of the things I am struggling to do through this is to keep working so I feel like I have a routine, and a touchstone. I'm good at work, and they like me there; they want me to keep coming back and they need me. And I like to feel needed.

The first people I told about the accident after family was work, and everyone I work with has been extremely supportive. They check in daily; they help me do things that sometimes aren't that easy for me, like getting lunch and getting home safely. And because they see me every day, they have a pretty good understanding of what this process has been like whereas candidly, aside from family, no one else really does.

I know this isn't a healthy balance, but that's where I am and again, that's one of the lessons I think this is here to teach me -- that a better balance can and should be struck. Every now and then, I consider taking an official leave of absence to fully recover, hopefully more quickly, but the notion is pretty terrifying -- it would feel like a free fall to be cut off from my routine, from seeing people, from what I'm good at. Without work, without a schedule, I would be left to my own devices and that's a scary thought.

So I'm left to try to trust myself and to know my boundaries and limits and I haven't got a clue!

The only thing I do know is, if I DO start seeing Bigfoot riding on a unicorn, I'm in more trouble than I had originally thought.