Okay, this is weird. I just realized I usually have a headache. And I have, for many years. I can’t remember ( 
if this used to be the case when I was a kid, or if it’s relatively recent, given my 2004 (re)injury.
I’ve been going through the different symptoms and after-effects of TBI listed on various websites, thinking about whether I’ve got any of them. And I do. Headaches are listed, but for some reason I never thought that I had a lot of headaches. Just to make sure, I did a quick check to see if I had one. Sure enough, I do. I have them just about every day.
I’ve been tracking my headaches for the past couple of weeks, and if I don’t start the day with one, I often end up with one by mid-morning or early afternoon. They can start in the back of my head, then move around to the left or right side… or start at the crown of my head, and then move down to the back. There could be more going on there… I need to check with my doctor about this.
Now, you may be thinking (and part of me agrees) that concentrating on headaches can bring them on. Certainly, tension can play a part. But the sharp stabbing pains that shoot through my skull now and then, are not something I can (or do) make up. And I have noticed them for many years. Tension only explains so much.
There could be other issues, I suppose. Serious health concerns that scare the living daylights out of most folks. But it’s good to check this out and see what’s really going on.
Then I can actually do something about it.
Interestingly, this brings up more issues of self-assessment with me. How could I have headaches on such a regular basis and be so clueless? Certainly, my pain threshold is higher than most folks’ I know — I credit years of strenuous activity and rigorous athletic training for that ability (tho’ perhaps it has more to do with my TBI than training). And I’m pretty good at blocking out things that don’t serve me.
But ignoring headaches for three decades? Or has it just been three years? That’s a bit eerie. I had come across a book over at Google Books called Women With Visible and Invisible Disabilities that talks about how some female TBI survivors don’t identify the pain they’re in… I’m wondering if that’s true for male TBI survivors, as well — if it’s particular to head trauma, that people lose the ability to tell if they’re in pain and if so, how much pain they’re in.
It’s oddly difficult for me to self-assess my own pain level. I just can’t tell, from one day to the next, how uncomfortable I am. And I’ve learned not to pay attention. I had some issues with chronic pain, about 15 years ago, and I guess I got in the habit of just not paying attention to it. Also, I’ve been physically active all my life, so I’ve usually been in some sort of discomfort from sore or pulled muscles, and if I focus too much on the sensation, it just drives me crazy. Frankly, some days the pain I feel in my body is so complete and consuming, I have to block it out, to function properly. Analgesics don’t help. Even prescription drugs don’t do the trick. So, I just think about other things.
Still, it’s unsettling to think that I’ve had headaches, all these years, and never realized it. Just as it’s unsettling to think that I’ve been cognitively impaired since I was 7 or 8 years old, and I never realized it — nor did anyone around me.
I’ve been plagued by this nagging sense of deep-seated uncertainty, ever since coming to terms with the idea of living with a TBI — and not knowing it all these years. The very idea that something so profound can be going on with me, and I never realized it, has been deeply unsettling and has caused me to question just about everything I have assumed about myself and my life. It’s caused all sorts of insecurity in me and the people close to me who are coming to terms with my situation, as well… probably thinking (too), “How could this have been the case, all these years, and we never guessed?”
I’ve also been hounded by a pervasive sense of betrayal, that my parents never got me the help I needed. True, 35 years ago, there wasn’t a whole lot people knew about the brain, and my parents didn’t have a lot of money when I was growing up, to pay for specialists and tutors and the like. But the fact that people just never acknowledged or addressed my TBI… and I was never afforded the opportunity to face it and come to terms with it and adapt accordingly… well, it’s a little much to take, right now.
But it’s a new year and a new start. I can’t sit around feeling bad about water that’s long since flowed under the bridge. I can find my own answers and devise my own course of treatment. Figuring out that I actually do have headaches is a step in the right direction.
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