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Letters From The Edge

Head Injury Hotline

Providing Difficult to Find Information
About Head Injury Since 1985
212 Pioneer Bldg.
Seattle, WA 98104-2221
206-621-8558
brain@headinjury.com
http://www.headinjury.com

Letters From The Edge: Inspirational stories that will change your life!

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Letters From the Edge

You're invited! We are compiling a book of inspirational, short stories called Letters From The Edge, a celebration of courage and tenacity in the disabling effects of head injury. We are honoring survivors of head injury for their strength of will, for believing in themselves, for overcoming adversity, for standing up for themselves or others. Letters From The Edge is meant to move you to laugh to cry, to ponder possibilities, to be encouraged to dream and to make those dreams a living reality.

The loss of self is often the tragic consequence of traumatic brain injury. It is seldom addressed by the medical profession yet it is a loss so profound that many never recover from it. Even a mild brain injury can seriously compromise human potential for learning, and personal growth.

In the blink of an eye you are transformed from a vital, productive person into a mere shadow of the former self. Then after what passes for a reasonable period of convalescence you take stock of yourself, and find that you are way behind where you ought to be. And, the most frightening realization is that you no longer possess the capacity to catch up. All things considered, is there any wonder that the self worth, and sense of self (personal identity) are down the tubes.

Living with brain injury is a process that requires tremendous accommodation and adaptation. Brain injury changes the way your brain functions, and as a result everything about you changes. The way you feel changes. The way see yourself, and way you see the world changes too. Things that were once second nature become strange, and difficult. Things that were once easy, and routine now require considerably more time, and effort.

The extra effort, vigilance, and concentration needed to compensate for such deficits result in an enormous fatiguing effect. Such extra effort produces a continuous drain on already taxed energy levels, and results in chronic fatigue. Intellectual functions such as short-term memory, reasoning ability, and judgment tend to deteriorate as fatigue increases. The extraordinary effort required to compensate for such impairments give rise to a vicious cycle that leads to feelings of inadequacy, discouragement, irritability and depression.

To that mix you add problems caused by: a defective attention span, disinhibition, faulty visual acuity, diminished alertness, and altered consciousness, and you've got an ugly mess on your hands. Stripped of your vitality and sense of self, there you are naked, exposed, foolish, full of misjudgments, impulsivity, and indiscretions. More dead than alive your life takes on features of the damned, the unloved and the unwashed.

Once you come to terms with the horrifying mess that you life now resembles; the next step is to learn to live well in spite of it. Sounds easy enough, but the doing of it takes insights, skill and determination, but it can be done, and we can show you how. The alternative is to throw yourself off a cliff and be done with it, because unless you take it in hand it will become the dog that wags you.

"To bring about insight it is necessary to confidently rely upon the inner strength and correctness of your character while allowing the forces in your current situation to fully act upon you. In this way you establish direct contact so that you may comprehend these forces and gain advantage over them. This idea can be compared to the chinese martial art Tai Chi Ch'uan, where you yield to your opponent in order to receive his power and understand his direction. You then know where and when to direct a corresponding effort to overpower him. The object here is to co-ordinate your forces so that there is a minimum of conflict and a maximum of effect. " Source -- I Ching Workbook

Below is a collection of Lessons To live by. They offer insights into living with brain injury from those who have been there and done that, and thrived in spite of it. If you have Lessons to share email them to us and we will add them to this page with appropriate credit to the author.

	Avoid telling lies; the truth is hard enough to remember.
	Avoid high stress activities several hours before bedtime.
	Put off making complex decisions when you are tired and or hungry.
	Realize that your bio-rhythms have been changed by your brain injury. Analyze your new cycles and schedule your most difficult or taxing work for when you are fresh and rested.
	Avoid engaging in novel and/or potentially dangerous activities when you are tired and distressed.
	Realize that your sense of knowing has changed -- trust your instincts -- you know more than you think you know.
	Accept that the old self is gone -- destroyed by brain injury.
	Release the old self -- ritual bury the old self before moving on with your new life.
	Listen to your body, take time to get to know your new self. You are likely to sense things differently, and respond differently than you did before your brain injury.
	Analyze and accommodate your new learning style.
	You know you should give up and go to bed when you can't get anything done no matter how hard you try.
	I leaned that there are a few knowledgable compassionate professionals out there. I also learned that even under the best circumstances the consumer has to be wise and careful.

National Institutes of Health Traumatic Brain Injury Rehabilitation Consensus Statement, October 1998. Print out from the internet, or request your free copy by toll-free telephone 888-644-2667.

Head Injury Hotline: Providing Difficult to Find Information About Head Injury Since 1985

brain@headinjury.com