Brain injury and personality

[Boudica]

Hello peeps,
Has anyone out there sustained a traumatic brain injury? When I was only 18months old I sustained multiple skull fractures. I lived in the country and was sent down to hospital where I had an x-ray and stayed for observation for a bit. However, in those days they did not have the scans they have now, and I was sent home to carry on my life without any treatment or intervention.

Fast forward 30 years and I found out from the optometrist that I have double vision, so that if I am not concentrating or I am tired I see you with two heads while you talk to me. This was not picked up previously as I never knew there was a different way to see things and my brain mostly manages to edit the images so that I can function to do things. The optometrist believes that it was a result of my childhood head injury. This led me to believe that it is likely that I sustained an amount of damage to my brain that I had to adapt to growing up.

I was always a top student in school, so I think intellectually I was okay. However, my Grandmother always said that my personality changed after the injury, and it has left me wondering who I would have been if I hadn’t sustained the injury and questioning which parts of my personality are me and which aspects of myself are some kind of damage. I have struggled my whole life with anxiety and I am socially awkward and I forget names and sometimes faces. I have never been very good at converting thoughts into speech. Are these things me or are these a result of something broken in my head? Does anyone else have a similar experience where you don’t know if who you are now is your natural self, or a weird Frankenstein creature that was borne out of injury? Because of my messed up vision, I find I question my abilities, my personality, the way I relate to other people.

[Boudica]

Hello,

To be honest the fall means nothing to me, as I was only a toddler so have no recollection at all. I think it caused tension between my parents though. My mum was home, but she did not have a phone or car at the time and she did not seek help from the neighbours, so I was not sent to hospital until my Dad got home late in the day. My mum had a rough time as my father worked a lot and she did not cope so well being a stay at home mum (she had been a beauty queen and indulged favourite daughter as a teenager, and did not adjust well to a domestic life in a country town). My brother and I each had a few near death incidents in our early years (eg. example I was brought in from the middle of the main highway by a semi-driver at 11pm one night when I was just a crawling baby, and my brother crashed a car into the barn when he was just 4). There are advantages to limited supervision though, providing you survive the risks, and my brother and I both grew up to be very self-sufficient. I probably over-supervise my children, they live in my pockets it seems.

Ha ha, sorry for the rambling stories. It is weird to dust off childhood memories, they seem a world away from modern times.

I'm sorry about your stroke. It's great you're able to soldier on, and not really feel any difference.

[geoff]

Hello Boudica, it is really sad about these near death incidents, the ones that you've had and the many I've had, they say a cat has nine lives an uncanny ability to walk away from disaster, well I don't know about you, but thirteen for me sounds better, whereas my twin hasn't had any, but I always congratulate him.

Take care.

Geoff.

[Boudica]

Hello Geoff,

I hope you are feeling at peace today and there was some sparkle in your day 🙂

To be honest I don't really think of past near death experiences with sadness anymore, I instead try to think of myself to be lucky and strong to be still here. I think it would be fascinating

I like to liken myself to a tree that has grown in an unhospitable place, with roots grown in rocks on the edge of a cliff, windswept by coastal gales. I'm sure you have seen one, the twisted gnarled ageless tree that has withstood the battering of time. That is us I think. While perhaps we don't grow as tall and lush as those that grew on fertile lands with the protection of the forest , but there is still a rugged beauty in our imperfection and resilience.

[geoff]

Hello Boudica, I think having near death experiences of perhaps thirteen or so has made me change into a different person.

A good friend asked me why am I so calm after an incident that years ago I would be horrified, annoyed and definitely cross and I said I didn't know, but thinking about it and after all these close situations (13) it has mellowed my personality.

Has that happened to you.

Take care.

Geoff.

[Boudica]

Hello,

Being mellow is probably a good thing Geoff. Actually, for me I haven't changed, I have always been super calm (at least on the outside). I've never been someone who gets angry or riled up, but I have always been surrounded by chaotic people with awful firecracker tempers and probably have learned not to react much people or situations. Would I have been the same without a head injury - I guess I will never know. Maybe I take on internal stress without really reacting in an outwardly emotional way though. I have faced a lot of criticism from others for being cold and unemotional over the years, but I contend that I am misunderstood!

My daily life is stressful though, I presently care for my 12 year old son who has autism. He does not have an intellectual disability, but he have very little ability to self regulate, so I must be constantly observing to watch for physical signs he is getting agitated and then work on de-escalating him. It is tiring regulating someone else's emotions for them constantly. He is bigger than me now and can be very explosive and aggressive with little warning, as well as doing some pretty dangerous impulsive things at times (he started a fire in the house yesterday by piercing a lithium battery - this is the 5th fire he has lit in various ways so I have to be vigilant). I just put the fire out and explain to him what the consequences of his actions could have been (again). I feel like these days someone would have to do something pretty extreme to get much of a reaction out of me.

I meant to write in my last post 'It would be fascinating being a twin' somehow I deleted the end. Is your twin identical? How different are you in personality?

[geoff]

Hello Boudica, great talking with you.

You certainly have had your hands full, since you were young up until now and it does take an incredible person to be able to cope with all the situations you've been in, and that I applaud you.

My twin and I are fraternal, he is smaller than me but eats much much more than I do, but he has ESP, he knew that I had been assaulted and was medically in trouble, whereas unfortunately, I don't have the same as he does, I really wish I did.

We do have similar sporting interests but our personality isn't the same and even growing up we always stuck by each other and did exactly the same together.

I was always the one that got hurt, injured, that didn't worry me, I can say that now, and we had three other siblings, all older than us.

Best wishes and all the best.

Geoff.

[Boudica]

Hello,

I hope you are having a good day (or evening by the time you read this, as I see you are a creature of the night!).

Thanks Geoff, that is a nice thing to say. I am not incredible, I have had no choice but to cope, and I often feel completely overwhelmed. I also fantasize about running away and starting a new life amongst strangers in a different place where I can pretend to be someone else.

It is great your brother and you stuck together, it's nice to have someone in your corner. I had a great friend through my early school years who had my back, and it was a great feeling, she was really special, and we have recently found each other again. I've never known someone who has ESP, it must be really distressing to feel someone you are connected to in that way is hurt and in trouble, but not really know why or where or how to help them.

I have an older brother, but growing up he was a terrible bully and much bigger than me at 6 foot 4, so I spend my teenage years trying not to be at home or hiding. I left home at 17 and I saw very little of my brother until 10 years ago. Then one day he called me on the phone, he was very intoxicated and really distressed. I went to visit him straight away (a 2000km drive each way), we didn't speak about the past at all, but I decided it was time for me to let it go, and we have kept in touch ever since and help each other whenever we can. Our mum has an untreatable illness, so in time I will be the only family he has. Time changes things, we don't have any common interests but we shared a (challenging) childhood, and that counts for something and I want to see him happy.

Part of the reason I concluded that my quietness / (great listening skills!) is a result of the TBI rather than nature is everyone else in my family seems to have the ability to talk endlessly (sometimes boring me into a coma). I don't really notice that I don't talk much at all, I have a great aptitude for silence, but other people certainly do, and it can make them quite uncomfortable. When I first meet people, they think I am shy and try to draw me out of my shell, but shyness is different. Do people find anything about you odd, when they first meet you? How do you deal with it?

[geoff]

Hello Boudica, you seem to be lovely and know what you're saying and isn't it amazing that your brother did ring you, that would have been a big surprise but shows you that really he feels attached to you, as I also had a brother 2 years older than my twin and I, who used to bash me up, probably because he was annoyed with my OCD habits, that's when I started to hide what I was having to do, but now we're close friends.

Time certainly does change family connections, and I'm sure he needs you more because you had to drive 2000km each way, that's a long distance and would love to have your thoughts over this distance.

My family are the same as yours, especially as a couple who keep asking me question after question before I've finished answering the previous one, that's why I don't go to any family gatherings and prefer to stay home.

I think my personality has changed so much over the years, caused by so many different factors, but I seemed to have mellowed in the last few years as I've had to cope with many difficulties mostly physical, as they say, cats have 9 lives, I think I've exceeded that by a long way, that's why I've mellowed.

Good talking with you.

Geoff.