"Brain Injury Is ..." Brain Injury Defined By People Who Are Living With It

Its like living in a constant state of anxiety, sometimes panic. Its like wanting to be normal and have normal communication with others but no matter what you do you can't control your words and emotions. Feeling out of control all the time. And needing so much sleep per day there's no room to live a normal life.

My filing system (aka my brain ) is broken. Information comes in but is often filed in the wrong places under the wrong name or only a piece of it gets filed and in a totally unrelated section. I feel like everyone else has a computer and I’m still doing the filing by hand. The info i need is in there somewhere but finding and retrieving it is a nightmare process there is no order only chaos. The hardest part is that you know that you know something it seems familiar it’s right on the edge of your thoughts but because it wasn’t properly filed away it remains beyond your grasp for hours sometimes days until you either find the missing files or give up looking. I know I am a different person than the 16 yr old before the brain injury- it’s so hard to be someone you’re not my reality always feels a bit off like I’m in a play I’m a character performing my role but it’s not really my life I can be really good very convincing that I am the character I portray at times and other times I just feel homesick for something or someone that’s always beyond my grasp

It may have appeared that an inanimate object was taking the lead in ruining my life but having flat-out refused to give up that modicum of control, I draw back the power from a red light and move forward, by my own choosing.
--Murray Dunlap

I hate myself or the person that's here now . Things fall out of my memory. The feeling of worthless when I let someone down because something that suspost to be important to me and them just slips out and they think I'm doing it on purpose. I want to be normal again but gets farther away with every second of that clicks by .

Trying to get through a storm in my head

Missing the person you were and never being that same person ( personality, strength and same wisdom) ever again. The simplest thing can be a very big challenge. Memories are locked away you want them back. Like watching a movie you know youve seen before but not remembering the dynamics

Involved in a serious motorcycle accident. The ONE thing I do to make every problem in my life temporarily dissappear. The one thing I did. I am lost. I am scared. Not being able to describe it is one of the scariest parts. It's like that feeling before the most important job interview of your life, mixed with watching someone hold a knife to your child's throat mixed with your stomach turning when the roller coaster your on drops down a huge hill. But feeling it as soon as your eyes open in the morning, while getting ready for work, while working then coming home knowing tomorrow isn't going to be better. It's been two years but my memory makes me feel like it was last week.

being dropped into another person's life

Living in a strangers body for the rest of your life while relearning everything all over again.

It's like a tornado of information spinning overhead,things start to slow down,make sense then the switch is turned off and
I realize I have no idea what is happening

A devastating loss of self, a stranger in my own body, feeling like I’m walking through a muddy fog

It’s like living in a constant state of blackout . Jo

Some days its like a nightmare you cant wake up from.

Now my brain is like a old pinball machine.
Only this one has 4 sets of flippers, 9 bumpers and 3 active balls constantly.

My name is Nancy Burnet. I experienced a traumatic brain injury April 29, 2016, just 2 months and 3 weeks after having aortic valve surgery due to complications caused by breast cancer treatment dating back to 1880 and 1981. An 89-year-old man driving a rental car at twilight literally turned a corner and hit me in the head; this could only be possible because I had stepped off the curb and turned my body a little to the left as I bent over to look at grocery items in my cart. His view may have been obstructed somewhat by a small tree, a bench and trash cans at the bus stop next to where I was. The fact that I was on plavix (a blood thinner) would greatly complicate my recovery. The man did take me to the nearest hospital a mere two blocks away and waited there in his car. From there I was taken by ambulance to the University of Pennsylvania Trauma Center in Philadelphia. After the ambulance arrived, I had absolutely no memory of the next six days I was in the trauma center. I spent approximately one month in one rehab and another month in another. My most significant concern after all this is that my balance is greatly impaired and I'm prone to falling; I was also left with an incontinence issue. Having diabetes has also added to my difficulties in life--a disease extremely common to my mother's side of the family. I also take humira for plaque psoriasis, a disease prevalent on my father's side of the family. Another complication resulting from breast cancer treatment in 1980-81 is lymphedema. It usually manifests itself 2-5, at the most 10 after surgery and radiation has been administered. Fortunately, it took 28 and 1/2 years to develop, and considering it is a difficult condition to manage at least I had all those years I didn't have to deal with the condition. An atrophied muscle in my back near my shoulder area due to a nerve being severed during the surgery for a mastectomy has limited the use of my right arm. Getting back to the brain injury: My recovery was remarkable, considering the bleeding on the brain that occurred due to being required to take plavix after the aortic valve replacement; the bleeding on the brain necessitated an emergency craniotomy surgery when I was admitted to the University of Pennsylvnia Trauma Center. The piece of skull was frozen then replaced under my scalp in I surgery in August of 2016. So this is my story. At 74 going on 75 I am living independently in an apartment for seniors. Because of my balance issues and the broken up pavements and streets, as well as high curbs, I take a four-wheeled walker which has space for groceries and other purchases with me when I walk outside. I also walk a mile and a half in my hallway (63 lengths of the hallway). I'm working on increasing that the 2 miles. I need to focus more attention on balance exercises presently; it difficult to balance myself on one leg at a time for more than 4 second--the goal is to be able to do that for 10 seconds.

Having a injured brain feels like the lights are on but no one is home..i look in the mirror and see my reflection it must be me but i dont feel like i used to or recognise my self anymore ..im not the same inside as i mite stil on the outside... annette..s..

It’s a new way of life. You are a new you, but you never realize until you think about it. Everything feels normal, and you feel like everything is how it should be. But then you look back. You remember. You remember how things used to be. You remember how you would never get mad, or how you would rarely be outspoken. Then you look at yourself and it’s like looking at a stranger. There is the you before the accident, and the you after. Two you’s, and they’re sometimes night and day. You miss the old you, and you wonder why. Why? It’s not like you switched bodies with someone. It’s not like most people would notice a crazy difference. But you do. You notice, and it eats at you. The differences and changes. All of it. The fact that you’ll never be the same. The fact that you’ll never be 100%. It eats at you and it’s depressing. But it’s also just one more hurdle. One more mountain for you to climb. One more struggle. One more fight. To make yourself better. To show not just everyone else, but yourself that it doesn’t matter. That the new you is not worse. That you can learn to live as a new you. To leave your mark. To show everyone you’re not someone to pity. To show them that that 5% doesn’t define you, YOU do.