I had to figure out how to bring my temperature down and stabilize my thermoregulation; I had to, have to continue, to figure out how to rehab my reading; I had to figure out how to persist in relearning skills, doing life in a new way long after bean counters in hospitals and insurance decided I no longer needed outpatient and community care. Do I have to figure out how to grieve brain injury, too?
In all things, I began with standard medical care, with learning the medical system’s usual way of approaching relearning, living with brain injury. When that showed itself to be completely inadequate, I sought better care that actually treated. They taught me things, but they too went only so far. After that, and also when I failed to find any help whatsoever for some problems, I had to seek the answer within myself from painfully pulling out old neurophysiology and psychology knowledge, willing my brain to absorb new knowledge from reading, and putting it all together through writing.
But I never thought I’d have to do that for grief!
I thought eventually I’d find someone who got it, who knew how to guide me through grieving the death of myself because they’d learnt it from experts and they’d worked with other people with brain injury. I was wrong.
Brain injury has been around for eons. Loss of self has been a known effect for eons.
So why is there no help‽
This is like hell ten times over.
There’s no help because the psychiatric model labels it depression. The neurophysiological model focuses on healing the physical brain. The therapist model extols the virtues of discovering who you are now. Friends and family model get sick of hearing the confusion, the pain, the repeating what-the-fuck-is-going-on-help-me! cry.
Eighteen years, two months, and seventeen days, and I’ve not had one consistent stretch of grief work. And I’m not alone. No wonder after a couple of decades of seemingly doing “well,” people keel over. Grief doesn’t disappear into happy positivity that the experts and family want us to leap into on the day of our diagnosis. It lurks until the work of relearning, of learning a new life, of becoming used to the routines of daily living, is done and brain space opens up. Or a bad event will throw the entire system into shock and grief flows back up like a magma flood.
What do you want, my neurodoc asked. I wanted my grief to be respected as real and different from depression and from grieving another human being; to be honoured with consistent healing work. I guess I’ll have to do that alone too. The only way I can think how is through my writing.
