I Have a What? A Guide for Coping with Moderate-to-Severe TBI

RRTC ON COMMUNITY INTEGRATION OF PERSONS WITH TBIby Jason FergusonSome of the problems that occur after brain injury are very common but do notnecessarily affect all. One of the most common is a headache. For me, I had some at first (ofcourse) and then I did not have them for a long time. I thought to myself “Ha! I got past thatone,” but I still have them. Sometimes they are mild and at other times they are terrible.Fatigue is something that usually gets all of us. This is very common because yourbody is trying to heal. It takes a lot of time and rest for this to happen. Just because youare tired and sleep a lot does not mean that you are being lazy or that something is wrong.When I first was released from the hospital, I would take two or three long naps a day. Mysleep was all off. I could not just hop back on a schedule and stay up all day. Listen to yourbody, it knows when to shut down.Lack of awareness is also a common problem. Or may I say not being aware thatcertain problems or personal actions exist. A lot of people confuse lack of awareness withdenial, but it isn’t the same. Denial would be having a drug problem, doing drugs andbelieving that you don’t have a problem. In some cases, it might be saying a word or phraseall of the time and not realizing it. For instance, I had the worst habit of saying “ya know?” Idid not realize this until my wife brought it to my attention. One day she told me “No, Idon’t know.” I had her point out to me each time I said, “ya know.” I started to get on myown nerves. I don’t do it hardly as much anymore “ya know.”Another common problem is poor attention and concentration. Simple tasks such asreading a short story can be a difficult task. At first, I could not get past the first sentenceof a paragraph because I would get distracted by something else in the room. If there was aTV on in another room or if the cat walked by, I would lose concentration and be off onanother rabbit trail. It is still hard for me to try and hold a conversation sometimes withother things going on around me. It is better now, but still there. We all get distracted butafter a TBI it may become harder to focus on just one thing when there are numerous otherthings going on around you. These are just a couple of common issues that happensometimes. Not everyone will experience the same problems or to the same severity. But,hang in there because they do get better.Page 13