The Fall

I feared it for months after brain surgery.  I have avoided activities that presented increased possibilities. I have been careful, sometimes fearful.  We have heard the warning and lectures.  We have talked to the kids, they know exactly what to do if it ever happened.  All of our friends and family know how bad it could be.  We have joked and talked about designing helmets.  Yet it NEVER happened.  

Until it did.  Sunday at 8am I fell.  I slipped on the wood floors and fell down the wooden stairs.  It wasn't because I wasn't being careful.  It wasn't because I was in a hurry.  I wasn't participating in any dangerous activity.  I wasn't taking risks.  It happened in a blink of an eye.

I mostly remember the fall.  I remember my husband come running from the other room.  I think I said I don't know if I hit my head.  The next thing I remember is my husband over me saying baby you have to open your eyes.  Baby come back to me.  He told me I had passed out and had a seizure. 

It was a blur.  Off to the hospital.  I have never felt so awful.  I was terrified and didn't feel well at all. 

All of the questions and information being given to the nurses and docs.  Immediately rushed through triage, monitors all over me.  Questions about living wills and power of attorney.  CT scans.  On and on.  

Finally the CT was back.  No brain bleed.  No massive damage.  We do see the post operative brain changes, but don't believe there is any new damage.  Concussion, bruised/sore elbow and pain down my side and hip.  

Then here it comes.  The brain lecture.  Being told how I have to be careful, how I have to consider my activities, how I have to protect my brain at all costs.  The questions about if a helmet has been discussed and considered.  On and on.  Then he says it's not that we don't want you to live a full life, but we need to protect your brain.

Basically we want you to live a full life, but we don't want you to walk from one room to the other because you MIGHT fall.  So sit on a padded couch with pillows all around you so we know your brain is safe.

As I sit here today recovering I can't help but think about it all.  

I don't want to be that person, that patient.  I don't want to live in fear of what could happen.  I don't want to sit on the sidelines watching life pass me by, because something could happen.  Something can always happen.  

I don't want to be seen as that sick person.  I don't want to be the medically complex one.  I don't want to be treated like a breakable delicate flower, that will crumble if touched.  

That's not me.  But to them it is.  

I will forever live a balance of my medical file and ME.  

My husband has been amazing.  He has stood by me through 6 surgeries, learning to walk again, countless specialists, numerous new diagnosis', medication trials, pain management, pain unmanaged, daily life with neuro issues, and everything in between.

I can't imagine the balance it is for him too, the medical me and ME.  

I want to live my life without the medical side following me around, but that's simply not possible.  I will continue to live as I have.  I will be careful, but not so careful that life passes me by.  

And damnit if I ever need a helmet, that shit is getting decked the hell out, and I know just the person to get it done.  :)