I met with my wonderful counselor earlier this week, Jolene, and every time, she just kicks me in the butt. In a good and healthy way. In a way I can receive it, hear the words, apply the message, and have it make sense. It's so great to be with someone who GETS IT (the brain injury thing) and I don't have to work at explaining why I haven't been drinking but I'm slurring my words at 3pm in the afternoon. She's also had a TBI (Traumatic Brain Injury) and is single later in life, so we just get each others mindset in a lot of ways. It's really refreshing to have her explain her perspective and take on me before my stroke and what it is like being in my presence now. It's incredibly validating to have someone else notice the leaps and bounds of progress I'm (trying and attempting) to make along this journey. We both agree that this Amy has always been here, but a lot of the defense mechanisms that I used to use with other people to have them agree with me or try to outsmart them are diminished now, so I get easily flustered and frustrated. This typically happens when I can't get someone to follow my logic to see why they are in the wrong or why my way of doing something is easier or better for example. Take anything that a normal person does: it takes me twice as long to do. Take that book that you read before bed last night- twice as long. That paper- also twice or three times as long. I'm incredibly grateful to still be here, but when I get honest, I don't even want a remedy or a healing- I just want a cure, as if this hadn't had happened at all. It's so incredibly frustrating to have to sleep so much, fail tests in school, be pushed aside by friends, and deal with so much red tape and pain on a daily basis and then looked at like no one understands because they don't. It's incredibly isolating, especially alone. Not that having someone else with me here would make this easier, but at least there would be someone else in the process to go through it with me.
I unpacked some stuff last night from a challenge Jolene gave me, and since I had lived out of boxes for over a year, I really didn't think it had much merit. I was wrong. My head can think better. I actually have a place where I can come back to and call HOME. It's been 17 MONTHS since I could say that. Gosh, I've missed that feeling. She was right. I needed to unpack some things and actually have a place to come back and write papers and BE MYSELF at. Pictures and stuff aren't fully up yet, but I purchased the stuff today and I'm hoping to do that tomorrow after I help throw a baby shower for my friend Tara and read for a class.
love,
Amy Christine
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