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

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RRTC ON COMMUNITY INTEGRATION OF PERSONS WITH TBIPart B. Ways to change your thinking.How you think about problems has a big effect on how you feel and how you cope. Wheneveryou have a feeling, there is a thought that is connected to it. This thought helps determineyour feeling.For example, imagine that you are at a party and “Jim” joins your group. You are introducedto Jim, and begin to talk with him. You notice that Jim does not look at you whentalking and keeps looking over at another person in your group. There are differentthoughts that you could have in this situation. Each thought can lead you to having a differentfeeling.If you were to think, “Jim thinks he is better than me. He’s rude,” you wouldprobably feel irritated or angry.If you were to think, “Jim finds me boring. Nobody seems to like me,” you wouldprobably feel sad or lonely.If you were to think, “Jim seems really shy and uncomfortable. I’ll try to makehim feel welcome,” you would probably feel kind or caring.If you were to think, “Jim may be preoccupied with something. Maybe he is tryingto figure out if he knows that person from somewhere,” you would probably feelneutral.How you feel about a situation can affect how you act in that situation. If you think Jimfinds you boring, you might become quiet and self-conscious. You might even feel likeleaving the party. However, since you don’t really know why Jim was acting that way, youcannot be sure that whether feeling or acting a certain way is the correct response. For example,if you thought that Jim was being rude, you would likely feel angry. You mighteven decide to “tell him off.” But that kind of feeling or action wouldn’t be a good responseif Jim were actually feeling shy or uncomfortable.Each time we have a thought about a situation, the thought wehave influences our feelings. These thoughts that we have canalso influence how we act in situations.The good news is that we can learn to change the way we thinkabout things. This can lead to changing how we feel and how weact.Page 69
I Have a What?!:A Guide for Coping with Moderate-to-Severe TBIChanging how you think about things doesn’t mean you shouldjust “think positive.” Sometimes, it is perfectly appropriate to feelsad or angry or anxious or upset. However, sometimes we canmake ourselves feel badly by telling ourselves things that are notactually true. Nearly everyone has times where they cause themselvesto have a negative mood by thinking something that isn’tactually true.Steps to help you change the way you think:1. One of the first steps to changing our thinking is to notice what we are thinkingwhen we have a negative emotion. You can do this by writing down what you arethinking to yourself on a piece of paper. Write down what the situation is, what youare thinking or saying to yourself, and how you feel. You can call this your “ThoughtJournal.” [See the example below.]Date Situation Thought Feeling02/20/2008At my doctor’s office.She was 30 minuteslate for my appointment.She doesn’t careabout me. She juststacks her scheduleso she can make moremoney.Angry,Resentful02/21/2008Working late at theoffice.I’m never going to getthis done. People willthink I’m a failure.Anxious,upset2. Another step to helping you change the way you think (and how you feel) is to learnto recognize ways that you “twist” your thinking. These “twisted” ways of thinking(called thought distortions) are all pretty common. The following table describessome of the many ways in which our thinking can become distorted.Page 70
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I Have a What? A Guide for Coping with Moderate-to-Severe TBI

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