Still managing TBI issues, still paying attention…

Brain injury is a funny thing — not funny as in “Ha-ha-ha”, but funny as in “How weird – I didn’t expect that to happen at all”.

One day, I’m fine, feeling good, and not sure how or why I ever had issues before at all.

And a few days later, I’m teetering on the edge of complete nervous breakdown, trying to talk myself back from that edge with what I hope is a calm and soothing demeanor.

It’s really weird, how things just suddenly become HUGE ENORMOUS PROBLEMS, for no apparent reason. Well, actually there are very good reasons, and when I track them over time, I can usually see how they happened. The thing is, leading up to those HUGE ENORMOUS PROBLEMS, I’m feeling good, I’m feeling fine, and things seem like they’re going along at a pretty good clip.

And all seems like it’s well. For all time. And I forget that it’s ever been any other way.

Or that it could possibly become any other way, without an instant’s notice.

But it can get ugly fairly quickly, and when I’m least expecting it. I’m not expecting it, because my attention is focused on other things besides my frame of mind and my stress levels. I’m caught up in something “important” — and it often is, despite my diminutive quotation marks — and I have a lot on the line, and I feel like so much is riding on me doing such-and-such in a certain specific way… I’m caught up.

And that’s when I get caught out. Pants down. Short and curlies waving in the breeze. And I have to stop the madness, back up, and start to put things back together again.

It doesn’t much matter whether all the excitement I’m dealing with is good or bad — I get tired and my system gets stressed in either circumstance. In fact, if anything, good things bode worse for me, because I get so caught up and so consumed by what I’m doing, and the energy is high, and I’m getting more and more tired but I don’t even notice it, because there’s so much good happening around me. And I don’t want it to stop. So, I keep going, keep pushing myself, keep stressing my body with a lot of adrenaline, but not always a lot of good food and water and rest.

When unfortunate things are happening with me, it can actually be less stressful overall, because I’m aware that I need to actively manage my stress levels, eat right, get enough rest, etc. Because there are “bad things” happening, and I need to be up to the task at hand. So, when things are rough, I’m actually less stressed overall. Here, let me show you:

The good, the bad, and the results – the higher a rating is, the better it is. The lower it is on the chart, the worse the situation is.

Click the image above, and you can see the relative difference between sleep deprivation, anger, anxiety, and excitement – and you can see that my “AMF” (or “Active Management Factor”, which is the rating I give myself for how much attention I am paying to my situation) is actually a bit higher when things are bad – which translates into less anger, less anxiety, and less sleep deprivation. And more excitement. The less well I manage myself when things are going crazy around me — even if it’s a good crazy — the less enthusiasm I have over time, as well, so it’s an all-round whammy, when I don’t pay enough attention to myself and my state.

When things are rough, then I tend to pay closer attention, because I know bad things can happen. But when things are going well for me, I tend to not actively manage my situation, and then I lose out on things like sleep and good food and also excitement. Keeping up the excitement when I’m dog-tired is even more work, even if the excitement initially drives my behavior that deprives me of sleep.

I can easily get complacent, when things are going well, but the net effect on my overall system is the same — I wear out.

That’s kind of where I am right now – I spent about 15 hours yesterday working on a project that I am very fond of, and which I believe has a lot of potential. But today I am wiped, and I’m feeling pretty antsy. I did a LOT of work yesterday that was good, and now today I am feeling the effects of it. So, I need to take away the arbitrary deadline(s) I set for myself, and stop stressing myself over this. There is a lot of stress going on at work, these days, and I can’t afford to let everything get the better of me… which is the line I’m treading right now.

I need to be smart about this… and also manage this situation actively. It doesn’t help me at all, if I push and push and push… and then end up with a crappy result. I need to give myself more time, not let the adrenaline and arbitrary deadlines drive me. I need to do a reality check and just get myself collected and sane again.

Because I have more to do today, than just work on my project. And my project is the one part of my life that I’m NOT driven by someone else’s insanely stupid deadline. So, I can cut myself a break. Give things some thought, and let reason drive my motivation, not some crazy lottery-style pipe dream that’s going to solve all my problems in one fell swoop. That’s no good. Let reason prevail.

And so I shall. Because it’s a beautiful day. And I want to keep it that way.

Up early and moving on…

It’s a new day…

I’ve got two more days of work before my vacation. A real vacation. I’ve been sick and so has my spouse, so we are staying home and foregoing the Christmas-New Years journey this year. Doing all that driving does not do it for us. Not this year. At some point, you just have to say “enough” and do the most healthy thing, which is Just. Stay. Home.

In the midst of all the national debate on gun control, in the midst of the grief over those 20 kids and 6 teachers who were killed, in the midst of all the talk about how autistic/mentally ill kids need to be locked up, in the midst of it all, I come back to the fact that I really need to take care of myself in all this — and do the things that I know will keep me on solid ground:

• Good food
• Good rest
• Good company and not a lot of “social filler”
• Plenty of down/alone time
• Good exercise

Good. Just good.

This is the holiday season. A time traditionally devoted to helping those less fortunate and celebrating the Light in our lives. Whether you’re celebrating the lengthening days, or a miracle of Light, or the birth of a carrier of Light, or traditions that enLighten your life, this is a time of reflection and renewal all over the world. Just biologically speaking, it is very much a time of renewal, as the days begin to lengthen again, and spring is literally just a handful of months away. It’s hard-wired into our systems. Our very bodies know, something is changing for the better.

In the midst of all… this, I do remember what matters most to me — staying centered and calm, even when things are going south. I had a bit of a meltdown the other night. I wasn’t feeling well, I’d been “off” all day, struggling with my balance and nausea, and I blew up over some little thing that needed to be done in the kitchen that wasn’t getting done.

I tried to avert it, but it escalated, and it felt like crap. I felt like crap. Everything felt like crap.

I went to bed early, and I woke up feeling a little better. Did the same thing last night, too — went to bed early… and woke up early this morning. I still feel a little “off”, but I am getting used to it, so it’s not so terrible right now. I have a doctor’s appointment tomorrow morning, so I’m hoping that will help. My ears seem to be better, but I want to get them checked. Now there’s more pain than lack of balance. And pain in my ears is never good.

I sometimes have a hard time detecting when I am in pain, so I sometimes let myself go longer than I should in reporting and addressing these issues. My doctor says I’m a “risk-taker”. I think I just have trouble figuring out how much my system is compromised. I am so accustomed to things being not-right with me — sensitive to sound and light and touch… headache, neck-ache, dizzy, foggy — I have learned to adjust and accommodate and not let it stop me from doing what I need to do. But when I’m genuinely sick, that old habit can get in my way. So,  I’ll have to have a talk with my doctor, when I see them tomorrow. I don’t want them to have the wrong idea that it’s a sign of mental issues or deliberate risk-taking behaviors. Seriously, we need to have that talk.

It’s not that I am consciously taking risks. I just don’t perceive risks the same way that others do. It’s just another bit of information my doctor should use to better understand me. And I need to find a way to communicate this to them, that doesn’t make me sound mentally deficient. They already wonder about me, thanks to the TBI info.

Anyway, it’s all a process… an unfolding and evolving process, which isn’t some cut-and-dried step-by-step thing. It’s a winding path through the woods that I have to continually walk, to keep it passable and keep the proverbial undergrowth from taking over. It’s about practice, about tending to the basics, keeping myself on track, day in and day out. It’s about never quitting and always looking for some sign of progress, to keep myself going.

And it’s about taking good care of myself, so I can keep on keepin’ on, so I have the strength and the resources to look for the good and act on it. It’s about not letting the world pull me down and pull me even more off-base than I am already… so that I can think clearly and interact with the rest of the world at my best.

I have a week and a half of vacation ahead of me — just around the corner. Time to relax and rest and unwind… to recharge the batteries and do the things I don’t have time for on in my normal life. Walk in the woods for hours. Read a book I’ve been wanting to read. Work around the house. Clear and clean out some things. Write about what matters to me most, as long as I like each day. Tend to my state of body and mind and spirit. And sleep. Long and deep and often.

There may never be an end to terrible things happening in the world, but that’s all the more reason to take good care… so that I can respond appropriately — if a response is indeed required.

Onward.

Taking good care

Source: computix's photostream

I’ve been thinking a lot about how I do (and do not) take good care of myself. One of the ways I take care, is by eating good food. Lots of fruits and vegetables, as well as a balanced mix of protein and starches. And of course, I need sweets, too.

Chocolate has become a very good friend of mine. Not the specialty kinds with chilis and all that, but really strong, dark chocolate, with a minimum of 85% cocoa.

Good stuff.

Last weekend, I did not take very good care of myself, in the food department. Of course, it felt wonderful at the time — my spouse was away, so I went “off the reservation” and ate spaghetti and meatballs, meatball subs, garlic bread, chips, and soda(!). And I ate baked goods, too. Poundcake. Muffins. All the things I know better than to do.

I did it anyway. And I watched foreign films, which my spouse hates — they don’t do well with subtitles, which for some reason don’t bother me. Reading them causes me to miss about half the movie, but somehow I don’t care. I like the cadence of foreign languages. I feel like I’m traveling. I was on my own for the weekend, so I indulged.

And I paid for it for days afterwards. Not only did I gain back some of the weight I’d worked hard to lose, but my body felt sluggish and, well, blah. And I had another flare-up of joint pain, which hadn’t bothered me for some time. I could definitely tell I had strayed from the Good Path. But at the time, having a meatball sub smothered in gravy and melted cheese, and a bag of barbecue potato chips and a can of soda, was pretty friggin’ awesome.

So, I paid. Oh, well.

Whenever I see my neuropsych, the last thing they say as I’m leaving their office is “Take good care.” I also work with someone who says that when they part ways with someone. I usually say, “Oh, I will,” but I rarely stop to think about what that means.

Taking good care, to me, means making an extra effort to care for yourself — to care about yourself. It’s about devoting your focus and attention to yourself in ways that will sustain and support you. Very important. If we don’t take good care of ourselves, who will?

Tonight I’m “flying solo” again, but much as I crave it, I will not have a meatball sub. I will finish the leftovers from lunch, while I finish up my work for the day. I will take good care.

The magic of the right foods

You know, for years, I thought that my “mental health” issues were all about what went on in my head and my heart. I thought that the depressions I experienced, and the wild mood swings, and the general discontent with my life had to do with some sort of character defect or somesuch.

I got a lot of reinforcement from others for this, too. According to them, if I wasn’t feeling well in my head and my heart, it must be some psychospiritual malady. (I guess it comes with the territory of having lots of therapists for friends.)

Then I had a bad health scare, when someone close to me was hospitalized — out of the blue — with a pretty serious health issue. The crazy thing was, their health issue was totally preventable and it had developed largely as a result of plain old crappy lifestyle choices. Sitting up till 3 a.m. eating chips and cookies and drinking soda, and then sleeping in till 3 p.m., when they would starve themself all day and then eat a huge meal before sitting down in front of the t.v., seemed like a great thing to them… and to be honest, I didn’t think much of it — I just figured that’s how they were — until they ended up lying in a hospital bed in one of those gowns that doesn’t close in the back, with lots of tubes sticking out of them.

We both made some drastic changes. And I credit that crisis with having clued me in to my TBI issues.

How? Because I quit eating all that crap. Granted, I wasn’t up till 3 a.m. every night, chowing down on non-foods, but I took in more than my fair share of candy and cakes and cookies and chips and junk and soda and all those different sorts of “food products” that really gunk up your system. I also drank milk and had anywhere from 4-6 cups of coffee a day. I was constantly going, fueled by processed sugar and cheap carbs and caffeine, and when I crashed, I crashed hard — wiped out and still wired and not sleeping very well.

A lot of my craziest eating really took off after my most recent fall. I had trouble getting going in the morning, so I fell back on sugar and carbs and caffeine to pick me up. And I had trouble relaxing, so I just pushed myself till I dropped. I really depended on the sugar highs, the cheap carb highs, the jolt of coffee and coffee drinks (no Red Bull for me, thanks – I could never stand the taste). And it totally wreaked havoc with my system.

I just kept putting on pounds. Not a ton of weight, but a pound here, a pound there, till about 1/5 of my weight was nothing but fat. To some people that might not seem like a lot, and since I have a tall frame, it didn’t show on me that much, when I was fully clothed. But appearances aside, I just felt like crap.

And I couldn’t figure out why. I knew, in the back of my head, that I should be eating better, but I wasn’t sick all the time, so I must be okay, right?

Well, judging your health by whether or not you’re mortally ill is a lousy way to judge. It wasn’t until I stopped all the junk, started eating regular meals that made good nutritional sense, that I realized just how lousy I’d felt before. Lousy and foggy. What’s more, in the past, when my blood sugar was on a wild see-saw from all that junk food, and my adrenaline was really pumping with all that caffeine, I’d literally been blinded to how bad I actually felt and now much of a negative impact that bad eating had on my thinking and my behavior.

Once I quit chowing down on the junk, a couple of things started to happen:

I started to notice that something was not quite right in my life, and I was having trouble with things that I shouldn’t have been having trouble with (like money and reading and managing my day-to-day).

I realized that if I could notice something was wrong, I could do something about it. I started taking steps to identify and remedy the situations I was in — and in the process of noticing more and more of my issues, I put 2 and 2 together and realized that my fall in 2004 had totally screwed me up…. and that this wasn’t the first time I’d fallen or had my head injured in a way that messed me up for some time after.

While I was still pumped and primed with all that junk, I just raced through life, careening here and there, making a mess of things, but never stopping long enough to really examine what was going on.

Once I stopped the junk and started eating in ways that supported my body and my mind, I was able to commence the very difficult work of piecing my fractured life back together.

If I hadn’t stopped the crappy eating, I’m not sure where I’d be.

Good food was literally — in more ways than one — a lifesaver.

Remembering how good it feels to move

Changing the cat’s litter box, last night, on a whim, I hoisted the 20-lb bag of litter and did 10 overhead presses, just for the feel of it. Pressing against the weight felt good, in a way I remembered from my youth. In high school, I was a thrower in track and field, and lifting heavy weights overhead was a regular part of our training.

To this day, I still have pretty well-developed upper body strength. It’s diminshed, over the past five years or so, since my fall down the stairs and my “decision” to quit going to the gym. But I still walk with a thrower’s posture — poised for action, and leading with my shoulders.

It feels good to move. I had forgotten that, over my years of post MTBI inactivity. I became intensely uncomfortable in public places, and I became almost agorophobic in ways. I also became a lot more sedentary, just sitting for hours, literally doing nothing. Strange, how that goes.

But in the past several months, since I started getting on the exercise bike and riding, I’ve rediscovered how good it feels to move. Just to exercise, to engage my muscles in motion. To feel the blood rushing through my veins, the breath quickening in my lungs. And sweat trickling down my torso — a feeling I had all but forgotten.

And when I spontaneously lifted that bag of litter over my head and did 10 quick presses, my muscles warmed with a welcome glow, and part of me remembered — I used to know how to do this. And I used to do it a lot.

It’s true. I did used to do it a lot. In the years before my fall in 2004, I was a regular at the gym, and the “extra” weight I carried was all muscle. My doctor would lecture me, when I got on the scales and they showed I was “over”, but when I rolled up my sleeve and flexed my bicep, they stopped complaining at me being 10 pounds “overweight”.

I haven’t seen that doctor in quite a few years. I’ve moved on. My new doctor has never seen me in peak physical condition, and they don’t know I’m capable of it.

But what nobody probably knows — or would guess from looking at me — is that my body responds extremely well to exercise, especially weight training. Perhaps it was my athletic youth that set the stage. Perhaps it’s just a genetic thing. My dad has always been lithe and athletic, and he’s pretty much kept in shape over the years, as his brothers and friends have all gone to pot. On my mom’s side, my grandfather is also wiry and fit, despite pushing 100 years of age. Now, the women on both sides of my family tend to be heavier, which is where I’ve been leaning. But as a kid, I always took after my dad’s looks and build, so I’m guessing (hoping) that once I get past this lumpish existence, I can restore at least some of that past grandeur. Not all of it, perhaps… no, wait — why not all of it? Why not go even farther? Why not get even more fit? When I was weight training regularly, I consciously held back from my workouts, not wanting to bulk up so much that I’d have to work like the dickens to maintain it over time. I know for a fact, I could have gotten even more fit, back then. Why not do it now?

Why not indeed?

Well, anyway, first things first — I need to ease into this, so I don’t injure myself right out of the gate. I’ll need to use lighter weights from the get-go, so my muscles can get re-acclimated to moving in that specialized way. I’ll need to make sure I do some light lifting on a regular basis, and ease into the heavier weights slowly but surely. And I’ll leave plenty of time for rest. If there’s one thing that knocks the stuffing out of weight-trainers and compromises the quality of their training, it’s lack of rest. And poor nutrition. In training, I’ll need to eat right — and have plenty of protein. Keep the carbs as complex as I can get them — but don’t eliminate them entirely. My brain needs to quality glucose. No sense in getting physically fit, if my brain suffers as a result!

Balance. It’s all about balance. And as a former thrower, I know all too well what improper balance can do to someone who’s handling very heavy weights. It’s a recipe for serious injury. I’ve already been injured — plenty of times. The last thing I need, is more.

So, onward and upward. Back to the movements. Back to the sensation. Back to the muscle and sweat and fitness.

Back…

More morning brain boosts

I came to my senses and rode the exercise bike again this a.m., before I did anything else. It’s amazing to me, how much more awake I feel, after I finished my (relatively short) ride.

One of the things about TBI is that it can slow down the brain’s processing. That makes total sense, if the usual connections are sheared and the impulses need to hunt around for other ways to get where they’re going. It’s like the Loma Prieta earthqake in the SF Bay area back in the late 1980s – a former co-worker of mine spent 4 hours trying to get home from work, when the drive usually took them 45 minutes, tops. All the usually routes were washed out or diverted. And when they got home, their apartment was fine and there was no sign of anything having gone wrong… but all the dishes and glasses were lying smashed on the kitchen floor. Apparently, the building had rocked one way far enough to open all the cupboard doors, empty the shelves onto the floor, and then it rocked back and closed all the doors neatly.

I tend to think about TBI the same way — especially Mild TBI. Our world is rocked, and things get broken inside, but then we get rocked back into place, and as far as anyone can tell, we’re just fine. But all our dishes and glasses are lying smashed on the floor — and we have to tread carefully to not cut ourselves.

And the routes our thought processes normally take to get to and from where they’re going are also diverted and changed. So, it takes us longer to get where we’re going.

Absent restoring my brain to its original condition — as if there ever was such a thing, as I’ve been having mild TBIs since I was 7 — I can do some things to help it along.

This morning, I did some of those things — exercised, and then had a big glass of water, ate my breakfast, and took my vitamins. I am religious about breakfast — high fiber cereal with rice milk, a cup of coffee, and a piece of fruit. I’ve really cut back on coffee — I have a mug in the morning and another in the afternoon (no longer the 3-4 big mugs each day). And when I have it, I make a point of eating something while I’m drinking it, so it doesn’t upset my stomach.

This morning, I had a banana with my breakfast. I’ve read that a banana and coffee will help your brain work better. The potassium in the banana helps, and the caffeine helps with the absorption. Or something like that.

I also (amazingly enough) remembered to take my supplements.

• B-Complex for my nerves — very important
• Chromium Picolinate — helps my body manage insulin production and helps with how I use glucose in my system — also very important
• Fish oil from Norwegian salmon — deep sea, algae-fed fish which have lots of good fatty acids and Omega-3′s
• Evening Primrose Oil — for the Omega-6 essential fatty acid gamma linolenic acid (GLA), that is said to “support the body’s heart, nervous, immune and reproductive systems. The GLA contained in Evening Primrose Oil is a nutrient used by the body to maintain healthy cells and vital body functions. Evening Primrose Oil enhances the health and strength of cell membranes throughout the body, and promotes a proper inflammation response. Evening Primrose Oil is also used by the body to maintain healthy hormone levels.” (Note, I’m not including an attribution here, because it comes from a sales site… nevertheless, I think it’s interesting information. If you really want to know what site it comes from, you can Google the above sentences in double-quotes.)

Basically, my morning brain boost is about helping my brain get going in the morning and stay that way. I take the B-Complex to help my nerves, so I don’t get physically taxed by stress, which then fogs my mind. I take the oils for the brain and cellular support, and I take the chromium picolinate to help with how my body handles glucose.

The brain is the Number One consumer of glucose in the body. It needs it to survive — to think properly and to keep its energy level up. There’s good reading over at http://www.fi.edu/learn/brain/carbs.html — I’ll post a tiny bit of it below, but please follow the link to get the whole story.

Brain Energy Demand

Your brain cells need two times more energy than the other cells in your body.

Neurons, the cells that communicate with each other, have a high demand for energy because they’re always in a state of metabolic activity. Even during sleep, neurons are still at work repairing and rebuilding their worn out structural components.

They are manufacturing enzymes and neurotransmitters that must be transported out to the very ends of their– nerve branches, some that can be several inches, or feet, away.

Most demanding of a neuron’s energy, however, are the bioelectric signals responsible for communication throughout the nervous system. This nerve transmission consumes one-half of all the brain’s energy (nearly 10% of the whole body’s energy).

Read More…

Interestingly, one of the points of this web page is that the brain needs carboyhydrates to function properly. It pretty much pointed me away from those low-carb diets that everyone is crazy about. Especially with my head injury history, I’m not going to deprive my brain of its primary source of energy — carbs. I’m just going to be smart about it.

As in, balance my carbs with other things — if I have bread, I’ll have it as part of a sandwich that has plenty of protein and extras on it, like lettuce and tomatoes and other stuff, if possible. If I have crackers, I’ll have an apple (fresh with the skin on) to complement it. And if I’m really craving carbs, that won’t be the only thing I have.

Well, anyway, I have a full day ahead of me, and I’m off to a good start.

It’s wild, how much of a difference just 15 minutes of aerobic exercise helps me. That, and my brain boost breakfast.

Stay strong everyone — and eat right!