Confession of a Concussed Cyclist…one year later

August 19, 2015

The image is still very vivid in my head…perhaps it always will be.

It is impossible to put into words the fear you feel, knowing you’re about to be hit, and there is nothing you can do about it.

Tuesday, August 19, 2014…an ambulance is called at 19:51 with the report of a cyclist being hit by an SUV on the corner of Hillside Avenue and Willard Street, in Berlin.  I don’t remember the time of the call or the call being made at all for that matter, I know this simply from the first responders report. What I do clearly remember is how much my body hurt and how angry I was!  I remembering saying to my brother repeatedly “I’ve never been so mad in my life!”

Adrenaline is an amazing thing.  Within hours of the crash I felt…okay…I didn’t feel perfect (my shoulder and hip hurt a lot, my head ached, and I felt sick), but I felt like everything would be fine, that after a good night’s sleep I would be back on the bike.  This was not to be the case. Not only did I NOT get a good night’s sleep, but in the morning, my body let me know that all was not okay and that I would not be back on my bike that day, that week, or even the week after. When people would ask me “how do you feel?”  there were no words adequate enough to describe it. “Hurt”, didn’t begin to express how I felt. “Uncomfortable”, was an understatement. “Dizzy and nauseous” were just a part of a bigger problem. So, I could truly only respond with “I feel like I got hit by a car!”

Despite first responders and ER doctors the night of the accident; my PCP, the MRI technician, and the ER doctor that I saw the day after the accident all saying to me “how did you ever survive?” I still felt that this was going to be short-lived, a nasty speed-bump in life.  This ignorance of mine was confirmed when I saw my first neurologist and he confidently told me, despite the diagnosis of a traumatic brain injury, that within three months I’d be back to my old self.

…three months came and went.  Then six months came and went. That whole time I remained in denial about the severity of the head injury and my neurologist continued to reassure me that this would fade quickly.  Despite my ignorance of the truth, I would become depressed and frustrated when the “deadline” (given by the neurologist) came and went and I had not met the expectations, so I finally asked him to stop giving me a time-table…it wasn’t helping.  Around month eight, post accident, while meeting with another neurologist, I asked her to be brutally honest with me, to not sugar-coat a thing, and to tell me what to expect. See, there’s a “rule” out there that I’d never before been aware of. The general rule of thumb says “whatever you are one year after the accident, is what you’ll most likely always be.”  I was informed of this rule very soon after the crash and it haunted me; I counted down days to the “one year mark” willing my brain to improve. So when three months passed, then six months, then eight, and I still was not better, I began to really lose hope that this truly would just go away. At month eight, when I asked for the honest truth, I got it…what has improved will most likely continue to improve.  What hasn’t improved, most likely will remain the same. I knew what had improved (the nausea, the dizziness, the weak legs) but I also knew what had not improved over the past eight months (my short-term memory, my ability to multitask, my occasional slurred speech, my trouble with word-retrieval and most debilitating, my migraines.)

Back when I was first told I had a traumatic brain injury, I researched it…I needed to know all I could.  If you Google “T.B.I.” one of the first things you will see is “your new reality”…what life is like after a brain injury.   Much like everyone else that commented when “your new reality” was mentioned, I too refused to believe this would happen to me, I kept telling myself “I won’t have a new reality…I will go back to my old one.” But as months passed and things were not improving I began to wonder “will I be one of those people?  Am I in denial that things will return to normal?” Remember I said at month eight, I asked my neurologist to be honest with me and tell me what to expect? Her brutally honest answer was what I needed to hear, to finally begin to accept that I too would now have a “new reality”.

So, what is my “new reality”?

• I have difficulty with noise, lights, multi-tasking, short term memory,  processing, and a few other cognitive functions
• I see a neurologist every two weeks to receive two, not so comfortable, injections into the back of my head to “numb” it as an attempt to mask the migraine.  Every ten weeks, I also see the neurologist for thirty-one injections around my head, neck, and shoulders to also numb the area and mask the pain.
• I have three different prescriptions to take as well, to try and make it so I can just function each day with the headache/migraine
• I have cognitive therapy once a week; I see a TBI specialist once a month; I have speech therapy once a month.
• More so when I’m tired, I have trouble holding conversations, focusing, word-retrieval, keeping my train of thought, depth-perception, etc.  These troubles almost look like being drunk and I have been accused of it (despite having no alcohol in my system) on more than one occasion.
• Some friendships have suffered since the accident because people can’t comprehend  what it’s like for me and I’ve had many arguments with family/friends to try and get them to understand
• I need to greatly limit my activity because I become too tired.  One year ago, I could have gone for a hike, a swim, and bike ride in the same day and still be fine to meet up with friends for a meal after.  Now, I can ride my bike and that’s about it. Some days I can ride my bike and one other activity, but I need to choose wisely.
• My ability to fully do my job is in question.
• I can only be around family/friends for small sections of time because I become too tired and overwhelmed by everyone and all the noise.  I’m losing time with my young nieces and nephews. And when I am around them, they are always being told to “be quiet…T has a headache”.
• Although I am back to riding, I do not ride as often as I’d like because my head doesn’t allow for it.  I remain nervous around cars as well which adds a new challenge to riding on the road. And anyone that knows me knows that biking is my world!!  

Today is my one year mark.  It saddens me that if the “rule” I mentioned earlier is true, this is now my life.  Migraines and a rattled head. I know the accident could have been much worse and I made out better than I should have considering the circumstances, but that doesn’t make the bad days easier.  I try not to be angry about this, bad things happen, but some days, the anger is consuming. I say that I would love for just one day to feel “normal” again (no migraine, no cognitive issues, etc.) but truth be told, over the past 365 days, I’ve forgotten what “normal” feels like.

If nothing else comes from this accident…from this blog, if you take nothing else that I say to heart, take this…share the road.  That cyclist that you’re driving too close to could be me.