You see, I did leave my therapist — back in 2009

Discussions can get fiery…

An interesting thing happened yesterday. I was going through some old posts that I had un-published for some reason, and I decided to re-post them. One was from 2009, where I was debating whether to fire the therapist I was seeing. That was almost exactly six years ago, today, and long story short, I did fire them. After I figured everything out.

With me, a lot of the stuff people say doesn’t sink in right away, so I have to take some time to figure it out. I have to ask questions — and I have to ask them the right way, so I don’t sound like an idiot. Truly, there are things that block me, that keep me from understanding what’s going on, and unless I can ask questions, I get lost.

That’s probably the issue with emails, lately. I don’t talk to real people enough, and I don’t get what they’re saying in writing. How ironic, that I need to talk to people.  Writing has been my preferred mode, for as long as I can remember. But the practice at having discussions with people has really paid off — and I’m a heckuvalot more functional at getting information and processing it now, than I was, at the time I wrote that post about my therapist.

I guess everybody’s like that, to some extent — we need to bounce ideas off others, get their opinions, see what they have to say, before we make up our minds about things. It’s not a TBI thing. It’s a human thing. For some reason, my brain tells me that I’m stupid and dull and not getting things. Then again, it’s not just my brain — it’s most people I’ve ever talked to about things I didn’t get, throughout the course of my childhood and youth. People just couldn’t fathom why I was so dense about some things, why I would miss details, why I would struggle with decisions that seemed so straightforward to them. And even when people helped me without questioning me, I had a hell of a time understanding their facial and vocal expressions, and interpreting how they really felt about me. It was safer to assume the worst, because I’d assumed the best about people so many times, and I’d been wrong.

If people tell you you’re an idiot (in so many words) — or you think they believe you’re an idiot — even if you logically know you’re not stupid, it starts to take a toll.

And you shut down. Which is what I did. I just couldn’t take all the frustration of trying to talk to people, trying to express myself, trying to make myself clear.

Truth be told, I still feel that way. I am definitely making progress with extracting needed information from others, but I’m still not  great at communicating in words. There’s too much going on, that can’t be translated verbally — it’s a whole world of sensation going on in my experience, that doesn’t lend itself to words.

And I’m sick of trying — and failing — to get my meanings across.

So, I’ll look to my writing to help me put things in order. It helps with my thought process, and it’s a huge help for my head. I feel much less alone, when I’m writing things down. Talking… that’s a very different thing.

Which is ironic, because I need to start looking around for another neuropsychologist. I know my current one is not leaving till March/April, but it takes time to find a replacement, and I need the time buffer to pick carefully. I’ve been ’round the barn with a handful of different therapists, all of whom eventually annoyed the living sh*t out of me — including the last one, who (I now realize) is just an a**hole with a license to do social work.

Caveat: I’m going to rant a little bit here about the last official therapist I had — cover your ears /scroll ahead if you don’t want to hear it…

Okay, so I was seeing this therapist, in addition to my neuropsych, to handle caregiver concerns about my spouse. The whole point was for me to get support so I can be a better caregiver, and also take care of myself. And that was my expressed intention, going it. But oh no… the therapist couldn’t just work with me on that — they had to spin my marriage into some sort of competition between my spouse’s needs and my needs, and they were actually gleeful, when they asked if my spouse noticed my behavior had changed to be less helpful, less sympathetic, since I started seeing this new therapist. The therapist was constantly talking about how my  needs were their concern, vs. my spouse’s — as though the two of us were competing parties vying to get our needs met from limited resources, and both of us couldn’t be served at the same time. They treated my marriage like a zero-sum game, where only one person could win, and my spouse was just taking advantage of me. They COMPLETELY disregarded the fact of my spouse’s neurological issues — the strokes, the diabetes, the panic/anxiety issues — and they treated them like they were a manipulative sociopath. When I told them about how my spouse would get upset over things, that therapist actually smiled and was pleased. Fuck Them. Fuck them and their self-centered, divisive bullshit. You go up against my marriage, and you go up against me. So, fuck you very much, you miserable, hard-hearted, shriveled-soul idiot.

Okay, enough. Obviously, I’m none too pleased with that therapist, and I’ve had a number of other experiences that have been similar. Everybody seems to take an over-simplified approach, where my spouse is either more disabled than they are (and getting worse, because after all, they are getting on in years and they do have their own set of issues), or they are not disabled, they’re just a manipulative narcissistic sociopath.

Granted, a lot of my spouse’s behavior could qualify as the latter, but they have neurological issues. And they’re not like that ALL the time. I need help managing myself and my relationship with them, and I need someone to understand that I actually do have some issues that I need to address.

And the approach that my current neuropsych takes — I have some issues, but I really blow them out of proportion because my thinking process is screwed up — that’s getting old.

Well, this post is turning into a longer one than I planned. It’s time to take a break. Give myself a breather. And chill out. I need to stay positive and pro-active, not get sucked into negativity from external circumstances. I’ve been sick. My resistance is down — and that includes my mental resistance to negativity. Best thing I can do, is look to the good lessons I’ve learned and focus on them.

Bad stuff happens all the time. But good stuff does, too.

And that’s where I need to put my attention. Hopefully, I’ll find someone to work with who feels the same way.

New site for how to slow your heart rate

A steady increase over the years – especially the past couple. Click the image to see the full size.

Over the past years, I’ve had over 300,000 visitors come to this site, seeking…

They especially seek out information on how to slow down a racing heart.

And since I have a reliable technique I use to slow down my own heart rate when it’s racing a mile a minute, I shared it. People found it. Some of them had better results than others, but I’ve got over 30 people telling me directly that it works for them.

As it does for me.

Most of the time. Sometimes, it just doesn’t work at all. I’m human. My body has a mind of its own, now and again.

Anyway, I wrote up an extended explanation of how things work for me. It’s a PDF that you can download and save to your computer, tablet, or smartphone and a bunch of people have downloaded it. It’s also an eBook on Amazon, which I think one person has bought.

I was reading my PDF and thinking about parts that need to be changed, fixed, and otherwise updated, and it occurred to me that I really need a site for this. Especially because people are asking about heart rate monitors, so I can put a store up there, as well so people can just get their gear at the same time they’re reading, if they wish.

So, this is announcing my new site slowmyheartrate.com — for folks who just need a simple, free way to keep their heart from jumping out of their chest.*

 

* Provided they have no serious underlying medical condition, that is.

Help is on the way… I hope

American Heart Association: Neck manipulation may be associated with stroke – see the little tear in the blood vessel wall? That can be caused by prior trauma. So be careful. Fortunately, network chiropractic involves an approach OTHER than structural adjustment.

I’ve got an appointment with a network chiropractor later today. I’ve been to network chiropractors in the past, and they really helped me, but I’m no longer willing to drive a long distance to get to them. Now that my commute is much shorter, I am much more protective of my time.

Plus, this chiro is someone I wanted to work with, years ago, but they were too expensive.

Now, they have special packages for people who need help, so I’m getting help.

What I’m really hoping for is to get a break from the pain and to be able to rest better, so that I can get back to normal and complete some of the big projects I’ve had going for some time, but which haven’t gotten wrapped up, yet. My plan was to have at least one of them done last weekend, but the car accident prevented that.

I need to just get back to normal and proceed… Onward.

I’m pretty hopeful about this. Network chiropractic doesn’t involve a lot of structural adjustments, which can be dangerous for someone with a history of neck and brain injury. Those kinds of injuries can cause clots to form more, because the walls of blood vessels may tear, causing blood clots to form inside the tears. And neck adjustments can loosen the clots which may go to the brain and cause a stroke. Or they can even cause the tears which can lead to clotting… and to stroke.

No thank you. I’ve got enough on my plate, thank you very much.

Network chiropractic is all about re-tuning the autonomic nervous system and getting your system properly talking to itself again. It’s gentle and it’s very powerful, and it helped me a lot in the past. I have high hopes for this new chiro.

And I’m also looking forward to this coming weekend, when I can (fingers crossed) settle in and do the things I intended to do last weekend. I have a lot to do, and it’s great stuff. I just need to be allowed to do it.

Onward!

Reset NOW

I just came across this video – pretty inspiring

No matter what people may offer you, if it means you have to sacrifice yourself or abandon your convictions, no way no how is it worth it.

Back from my trip to see my family, I am reminded yet again of why I left. The price of admission to the community my family is part of, is way too high. You have to abandon your individuality to be part of a larger group, and that doesn’t sit right with me. My siblings have all pretty much kept the continuity going, living their lives as my parents expected them to — with a few minor exceptions, here and there. I’m the black sheep. I have broken out. And looking at how things have developed, back there, I’m so thankful I stepped away when I did, and managed to keep my individuality intact.

My family and their community have specific ways of doing things that they believe are correct and right. Everything from how you tend your garden, to how you maintain your home, to how you walk and talk, and when you light the first wood fire of the year, are watched and commented upon by the neighbors. Almost every aspect of life is dictated by a combination of religion and tradition, and those who “buck the system” are not welcome. Tolerated, but not warmly welcomed.

And while that rigidity gives them a sense of continuity and comfort, it doesn’t leave a lot of room for growth and positive change — unless that growth and positive change is part of their world view.

If there is a problem in front of them that can’t be solved by the same old thinking, then that problem stays stuck.

Like the problem of the hoarder in the family that nobody ever talked about. And nobody could ever help.

Hoarding is a complex issue, and it has a lot of different aspects and causes. There’s the perfectionism, the personalization of objects, the inability to let things go, because of the emotional connection to them, the inability to see a problem (on the part of the hoarder), and the inability to creatively think about options and choices for how to live differently.

I never realized, till this last weekend, just how badly off “our hoarder” was. Nobody ever talked about it in depth, nobody ever took steps to address it directly. The standard response was through prayer and support and trying to talk sense into the hoarder — and to model a better way to be.

Nobody ever addressed the neurological issues they had — which are obvious and several — and nobody ever addressed this in a systematic, scientific way.

What a friggin’ waste of a life. “Our hoarder” is well into their 70’s, and they have lived in the midst of their own filth for some 30 years. And I never fully realized the extent of the issues. Had I known, I might have been able to do something. But now the past is done. The wrecked house has been cleaned out. And “our hoarder” is in a retirement home, where it is literally impossible for them to collect any more crap or allow their space to become trashed. Cleaning folks come in every week like clockwork. So, with any luck, the will get the help they needed all along.

30 years have gone by, leading up to this moment, and my relative has lived in their squalor all that time, unbeknownst to me. I have never been in a position to actually help them before, because I had so many issues of my own. And now that I am on my feet again with a much more robust set of tools and skills, I am in a position to help. But their situation has changed, and help with that part of their life isn’t necessarily needed anymore. At least from me.

There is literally only so much I can do for my own family. They are set in their ways, and I’m not sure they will be able to change. Outside my own family, however, I can do some things. Like living my life to the fullest, showing others how hope is possible, and keeping the faith each day in my own way.  I can reach out when and where it’s possible, and hope that I have a positive influence. I wish it were possible for my own family, but sometimes it’s just not possible.

So, I do what I can, where and when and how I can. And do my best to not take responsibility for others’ choices and actions.

You can’t save everyone.

But you can save yourself.

And it’s time for a little reset in my life — to take what I’ve learned from the past week, and put it into positive action in my present and coming weeks, months, and years. I need to sleep… and hope that my system will “integrate” the info from the past days into something useful in the future.

No sense in letting all the lessons go to waste, right?

Okay, time for a nap.

When bad things happen to good people

The road ahead is not always clear

Oh, this is upsetting. My neuropsych is having potentially serious health issues, and we won’t be meeting next week.

The upsetting thing is not so much that I won’t get to meet with them. It’s that they are having health issues. Their situation is not certain. You like to hope for the best and stay positive, but with the healthcare system as it is, you never know…

I really got thrown for a loop yesterday. When I first talked to them to cancel our appointment, I was fine. I was feeling very positive and supportive, and I think I helped them feel better. I made them laugh a little, which always helps. Then I took a nap later in the day, and when I woke up, I was very, very sad. Because if something happens to them, so they can’t work anymore, I had the distinct impression that I will go back to being alone.

And that made me so sad, I started to cry. I hate when that happens. I suddenly felt so alone, so small and so vulnerable. I felt like I was five years old again, being left behind as the school bus going home pulled away from the curb, leaving me alone and not able to get back home from my first day of kindergarten. In the past six years that we have worked together, my neuropsych has really been the only reliable person in my life who has not judged me for being different, who has understood the challenges I’m up against, and who has really cheered for my advances, instead of just treating them like something I should have been able to do, all along. If I lose their regular presence in my life, it’s going to be a real blow.

I felt kind of crappy, feeling that way, because it was all about me. I’ve been working on that tendency to always think of myself first and not pay any attention to anyone else’s needs. But I’m also feeling upset that this is happening to them, because they are a really good person who has been on the business end of life’s cattle prod many times too often, and I hate that they have to go through this — especially as they are nearing retirement age, and no one should have to spend their later years in terrible physical condition.

I wish there were something I could do, but my neuropsych is a private citizen, and it would be inappropriate for me to try to contact them outside our clinical relationship. I feel very helpless – life is just doing what it’s doing, and I can’t really do anything to stop it. All I can do is adjust. And take care of myself.

I hate feeling selfish like this. It really bothers me, that my first thought is “What will happen to me?” I know that is not a reflection of my “highest self”. I am better than that.

So, I am doing something about it, and I am searching online for volunteer opportunities, to reach out and help others. I don’t want to be “that person”. I want to be better. I know how good it makes me feel to be reassured and assisted with things I don’t know about. I’m very independent, and having additional help from experts gives me some measure of reassurance I need, in the midst of what can be a very confusing and disorienting world. I have skills I can pass along to others who want to learn, and by offering others what I myself seek to have, that can get me out of my funk and keep the focus off me-me-me.

In all honesty, I need to be thinking this scenario through, anyway. My neuropsych is at the end of their career, and they’re not going to be practicing forever. I’m fortunate/unfortunate enough to have worked with them when they are at the high point of their professional practice, having spent decades refining their approach and having already had tons of experience with what works — and what doesn’t.

I’ve had the good sense to avail myself of their help when I’ve needed it. The thing is, I’ve done so much of my work by myself — and then checked in with them after the fact — that it’s not their guidance I rely on; it’s their assessment and feedback about what I’ve done and whether or not the result is what I was hoping for.

It’s been one big, fantastic science experiment, in all the best senses of the word, and I’ve really benefited. And to be honest, so have they. They’ve never directly told me the details about how my work has helped them, but they once mentioned to my spouse that it’s hugely encouraging for them to work with me, as I’m so intent on getting better and really putting in the work. They said that most of their brain injury survivor patients aren’t willing to do the work to really get better. How depressing that must be…

The working relationship has been mutually beneficial for sure. I know they’ve gotten better, themself, because the difference between how they are now and how they were when I first met them, is significant. When I first met them, they were much more tentative, spacy, and absent-minded. They would forget appointments with me, they seemed more hesitant in so many ways, and they didn’t have their act together with billing and business management details.

In the past six years, they’ve really stepped up their game, and I like to think that working with me has helped. In, fact, I’m sure of it. And the time when I went to meeting with them every other week, instead of every week, they seemed to regret not checking in with me each week.

I guess one of the things that’s kept me motivated over the past years, has been knowing that my progress was helping another person. Knowing that getting better myself was helpful to my neuropsych — which then made it possible for them to help others — has been a driving force behind my recovery. It’s not just about me. It’s about all of us.

This blog, too, has been a big part of my recovery, and hearing from folks that I’ve helped them, or they respond to things I write, has been a real boost for me in so many ways. My TBI recovery doesn’t just belong to me. It really belongs to all of us. I happen to benefit from it — and so do many, many others.

So, that keeps me going.

And I wish I could do more. I really do. There are so many brain-injured people suffering and alone and afraid, because of what’s happening inside their heads — and bodies — that they don’t fully understand. That goes for strokes, acquired brain injuries, and traumatic brain injuries, alike. We’re all a little bit different from each other, yet we have so much in common. And we need to focus on that commonality. The professional community stands to gain from divvying up our issues into different categories and disciplines, so they can mobilize their resources to address each aspect. But for those of us suffering from the symptoms and after-effects and ripple-effects of brain injury, this segmentation just makes things worse.

Those of us who have experienced brain injuries need to be connected with the larger world. We need to be involved in a community. And the way brain injury recovery is set up in this nation, is the worst way to handle things for us. It’s limited by insurance and the abilities and knowledge of people who are not adequately trained in brain injury issues, and who frankly run out of steam, because brain injury does such an unpredictable number on its “recipients”. Also, our loved-ones get the brunt of things, because they’re ultimately our last line of assistance, but nobody out there truly understands

Lord, we are exhausting.

So, those of us who can, need to do something about it. I have posted the Give Back training I downloaded to my site here https://brokenbrilliant.wordpress.com/brain-injury-association-resources/give-back-tbi-education-for-survivors-and-families/ I hope people will make use of it. The information has helped me so much, and I do need to go back to it… and I shall. With a fresh look, years after the first time I downloaded it and started to read it.

I have some other ideas about how to help… including more ideas for this blog. I’m getting a bit long-winded here, so I need to wrap it up… and also get on with my day visiting my family. I don’t get to see them that often, so I need to take advantage, and get on with my morning.

I’ll be driving back home later today — and it’s another gorgeous day — so I need to get my act together, get off my damn’ pity-pot, and make the most of what I have. Each and every day.

Onward.

A tool to help me sleep

CBT-i Coach

I have been poking around on the Apple App Store, and I found a great little app for helping me deal with my sleep issues. It’s called CBT-i Coach, and it’s a mobile phone app for vets, service members, and others who are in Cognitive Behavioral Therapy for Insomnia.

I’m not in CBT, but I think this could really help me.

I’ve been filling in the details for my sleeping habits, and there’s nothing like having all the data right there in front of you, to tell you where you are.

They also have relaxation and mind-body exercises (although the audio doesn’t seem to work on mine unfortunately), and they have information on developing good sleep habits and getting rid of habits that interfere with sleep.

This looks promising to me. It’s another tool I can use – and it already feels like I have another helper in my corner, to assist with my sleep problems.

Just wanted to share that.

Help for a racing heart rate

This post How I learned to slow my heart rate is by far the most popular one on this site, and it has helped a lot of people, from what they tell me. Folks have shared links to it, and hundreds of people see it each week, which makes me very glad.

Some have even said it helped “save their life” — and that makes me even happier 🙂

It’s actually a really short post, so I have written an extended PDF version of this that you can download and save to your computer, tablet, or smartphone. You can also share it with others. It’s free.

Here it is: How I slow down my heart rate (click here to download)

Please remember: I am not a doctor. I am not qualified to give medical advice. I have just found a technique that works for me and helps me get my heart rate under control in a few minutes. I hope it helps others, but it’s not a substitute for medical care. See your doctor if you have issues and/or concerns.

Thanks. And be well.