EEG and MRI are both normal!

Woo hoo!

I had a visit with my new neuro on Monday, and they tell me that my EEG and MRI both read as NORMAL.

There is no sign of a brain tumor.

There is no sign of MS.

There is no sign of degenerative disease.

I’m way symmetrical and looking good.

At last, I’ve got some actual testing and numbers to show for all this. Enough of the guesswork — I’ve got plenty of notes and detailed observations about my life, but no doctor apparently has the time or inclination to sort through them all.

Plus, with my over-the-top attention to detail and fixation on things that are experientially important (but probably medically insignificant), who knows if anything I’ve recorded is even any use to them at all?

God, I love minutiae. But it doesn’t love me 😉

Anyway, I’m trying really hard to stay positive through all this. I think that part of me would have liked to see at least a little bit of “variation” on my test results, so I have concrete proof that something unusual is “up” with me.

But this is actually one of the things that makes TBI such a conundrum for folks — both medical doctors and people who experience it. Your test results can come back looking great, your CAT scan, your MRI, and your EEG can all come back normal. But there are real issues hidden under the surface that emerge over time and with varying degrees of difficulty.

And those issues can look like seizures or mental illness or ADD or OCD or some of the other “alphabet” conditions that are swimming around out there.

Or, worst of all, they can be interpreted as a lack of will, being a “bad seed”, being “sinful”, or old-fashioned “character defects” that have little or nothing to do with character and have everything to do with the brain not behaving as it should.

And it can make you crazy. Personally, I wouldn’t be surprised to learn that mental illness can emerge as a result of the stress and strain of dealing with TBI… with or without knowing it.

Well, I would love to write more… and I really want to. But I’ve got to get ready for work and stop at the bank to close the business bank account I opened back before I realized that I wasn’t nearly as capable as I thought I was, and my MBTI was propelling me forward in life, fueled by anxiety, drive, aggression, and a deep-seated need to prove to myself and the world that I was really doing very well… when in fact, I wasn’t.

I know now that the complicated tasks involved with running a business are well beyond my broken brain. I may be able to get back some of my functionality with some speech/occupational therapy, but that’s a ways off in the futur. Right now, it’s time for me to let go of that unrealistic drive and work with the limitations I have. In a way, it’s a huge relief. There are plenty of other ways I can prove my self-worth to myself and the world that don’t involve adminstrative paperwork and filing quarterly taxes 😉

Note: This was cross-posted at Daily Strength