Still trying to figure crap out

So it would appear that my physical symptoms of the concussion have subsided. I no longer suffer the headaches that I described earlier. I still get waves of nausea every now and again, but overall things have taken a turn for the better. However, I am still not 100% symptom free. If you saw me on the street and spoke to me, you probably would not know that I had anything wrong.

However, there are clearly still issues in the head that I need to work through. My handwriting, short term memory and general writing ability being the top ones that are my concern at the moment. As you might’ve seen from the twitpics earlier this week, my handwriting has taken a bit of a nose dive, to the point that I get frustrated with myself when I’m trying to write by hand. I have since resorted to taking all my notes on a laptop to make sure that I am able to decipher my notes and actually remember what I was doing, rather than having to hire an Egyptologist to tell me what I’ve written.

As for the writing ability, I can write at my normal pace, but I have to pay extra care into what I write. Sometimes what I write is not what I was supposed to. I forget words from sentences and sometimes the structure of sentences is a little bit wrong. I’m not using the excuse that English is my second language and that would be the reason why, but these are mistakes that I wasn’t making prior to the head trauma.

My memory is still a bit all over the place. For example, I dunked my hand into a coffee cup full of hot coffee the other day as I thought that it was full of sweets. Who puts sweets in a coffee cup? I don’t know but I guess it made sense in my mind before burning my fingers and thinking “Hang on just one darn minute, these are not jelly beans.”

The other issues I still have relate mainly to self image, but this is not an emo diary so I’m not going to start writing about what pants I want to wear and how I want my hair to look and so on.

Suffice to say, I’ve taken significant steps in recovery, but there are still a lot of things that just don’t make sense and a lot of things I find I’m questioning. Whether it’s a personality change caused by the latest concussion and one that has accumulated from the four others I’ve had remains to be seen.

The awesome thing is that I was able to last a whole work out a few days ago. OK I wasn’t pressing nearly the same weights as before, but it felt good to give the body some abuse after laying in a dark room for a week and a bit.

It’s all right man, I might’ve been bleeding man

I thought I’d take a break from updating the daily concussion update, because there was really nothing new to report and I doubt you want to read stuff like: “my head still hurts etc”. Everything is still slightly off kilter and I’m not feeling a 100%, though I have taken significant steps to recovery, or at least I feel I have.

 

I had an appointment with the doctors yesterday and what got told what I had feared. You might recall that I said I had 18 out of 21 symptoms listed for post concussion syndrome (PCS) and basically the doctor told me that I’ve got the condition. I had secretly wished that he would say that you’re still not fully recovered but you’re about 95% there and that it would be OK to resume normal activities.

 

What scared me yesterday was that I was told that it was likely that I had a small bleed in my brain as well that he didn’t spot upon first examination. However, the bleed was (if there was one) was minor to the point that doctors wouldn’t have done anything for it i.e. drill a hole in my head or remove a piece of skull.

 

My moods are still all over the place and I keep going from being happy to being sad to flat out enraged for no apparent reason. On a personal level this has been a trying test of patience, and my patience is wearing thin at times.

 

For the first time today, I wrote something by hand rather than by computer and here’s the difference. This picture: http://yfrog.com/h471529449j is from notes that I took on the 1^st of March and here is a picture of my hand writing today: http://yfrog.com/h2qr2pxj. Spot the difference?

 

On a positive note however, I have been allowed to start doing exercise again. I’m not allowed to lift heavy weights yet (damn it), but I have been allowed to do cardio work (hockey is cardio isn’t it?) and light weights. I went for a run last night and I did OK till about 8 minutes in. After that I had to take several breaks to let my coordination get back. I’m going to attempt the gym today and use the small dumb bells that are normally reserved for women. Man I’m going to get ripped doing that.

If it was Christmas, I know what I’d want

If Christmas was around the corner, I’d know what I would want. I would like a couple of good days in a row. Yesterday I felt absolutely fine, on the top of the world and pretty much laughed at everything and to a degree I still do. However, I had a bad spell in the afternoon and I felt the same symptoms as I did on Sunday morning. I basically started to fade again, but I had a nap and that sort of fixed it.

 

You might’ve read about my dreams being weird, but this time I had no dreams what so ever. Infact I didn’t even know I had slept. Well I did but I didn’t really register it. I sort of felt like I was floating in a void instead of sleeping, so I didn’t really feel rested.

 

I had a good chat with my brother and he actually said, jokingly, that there is a silver lining in all this in that I have at least one good, happy, day mixed in. The running joke is that I’m usually upset my minor inconveniences and get full of rage-a-hol from it. It is kind of true. I appreciate his view on things and it made me laugh, so cheers bro.

 

I still continue to struggle with my short term memory and here’s an example of it. I clipped my fingernails this morning and once I had finished one hand, I went to do the other, only to stare at it puzzled as the nails had seemingly vanished. It took a good couple of minutes of convincing myself that I had done it.

 

I also found a guidance pamphlet the doctors gave me during my first visit. The crap thing is that it contained a list of symptoms for post-concussion syndrome and reading them I was slightly depressed to see that I’m displaying  18 out of 21 symptoms associated with the condition. I’m not going to use a jump to conclusions mat (see the movie Office Space for that reference), but see what the doctor says on Monday.

There’s one thing I’d still like to figure out from today though: WHY THE HELL DID I WAKE UP WITH THE OOMPA LOOMPA SONG STUCK IN MY HEAD THIS MORNING?

 

Edit: this took me 18 minutes to write. Getting better.

Seriously Sensitive But Best Day Yet

After I posted my blog last night, I took a turn for the worse. My headaches intensified to the point I was ready to do the 3m dash to the bathroom at any second. Good thing I didn’t have to as I probably would’ve knocked myself out on a door frame or something else. My headache was so intense that I wanted to perform trephination on myself to try and alleviate the pressure in my head. Luckily the painkillers finally started to work and I was able to get some sleep. I did sleep rather well, to the point that I was woken up only at 13:00 when a friendly Jehovah’s witness rang our doorbell.

I was also overcome with a feeling of sadness and I wanted to ball my eyes out last night. I have no idea where it all came from but my mood changed rather drastically and I wallowed most the night in a mix of intense headaches and self pity. I was a seriously sensitive dude last night Otherwise, today I have been feeling relatively fine. My head is clearer than it has been for days now and I don’t feel as if I was living in a cloud. However, I’m still not 100%. I don’t think I could last a full gym work out or a jog.

There are still issues I’m trying to work through. One thing I have noticed the past week is that I don’t really feel like myself. Where I am starting to feel better, I feel as if there’s a part of me that is missing. I guess the problem with concussions is that they are like breaking a vase. You can try and put it all back together, but depending how bad you broke it, you’ll never be able to fit all the pieces back together. And I guess the symptoms and the emotions are as unique as the person who suffers it.

However, this has been the best day so far, but that’s not to say that I’m OK. I hope from now on I’ll be able to make significant progress day by day. My dreams are still weird and for the past few nights they have had a mexican theme to them. Go figure that out.

I’m also seeing the doctor again on Monday, so hopefully I’ll get some more guidance into where I go from here. Tell you one thing though, once I get the all clear from the doctors, the first thing I’m going to do is have an ice cold beer.

Also, good luck to my teammates this weekend. I won’t be able to join them on the ice, but hopefully I can muster enough focus to make the trip and watch them play.

Fake Sound of Progress

Feels like today  I’ve taken a few steps back. I went to bed last night feeling really positive and up beat, but I woke up with the mother of all headaches and my eyes are really sensitive to light and my ears are ringing probably more than they have during this ordeal. Maybe it’s the fake sound of progress. I don’t know.

 

My eyes have become super light sensitive again and loud noises are still a problem. Doesn’t help that the local council has decided to drill a hole pretty much outside my house. The other set back from today has  been the fact that my hands have been shaking from the intensity of the head-ache. I’ve tried to eat, but as with a bad migraine, food isn’t often the most appealing.

 

On the head ache front; it has been extremely debilitating. To the point that I can’t even sleep properly as the slightest stirring in my sleep wakes me up. I just wish that I could be put to sleep for a couple of days and hopefully it would help. That or some one drill a hole in my head to relieve the feeling of pressure in there.

 

I spoke to my parents again today, but I can’t bring myself to tell them the full extent of how I’m feeling. Mom, Dad, I know you read the blog and I know it must be frustrating to read more in depth updates on me here, rather than get them from the horses mouth. I’m sorry. I just don’t want you to worry yourselves sick over me.

 

On the plus side though, my speech  is not slurred anymore, so there’s some positives I can take from today. One thing that I am super-pleased about is that I’m able to write more at the pace I’m used to. My biggest fear was that I had taken such a blow that my livelihood would suffer from it. My profession relies on writing,  so I was worried I’d screwed up big time.

 

If anything writing these daily updates has been cathartic for me and I hope they shed some light to the world of concussions. I’ve had injuries ranging from bruises, back spasms to torn ligaments, but you know, I would quite happily take one of those injuries over this.

I’d also like to extend a get well soon note to Max Pacioretty from the Montreal Canadiens. He’s worse off than I am, but I can understand what he must be going through. As a sworn Canadiens fan I hope he makes a quick and full recovery.

Number 5

It is now 23:00 GMT as i started to write this.

Saturday: Second period, we’re on a PP. I’m in the corner. Out of nowhere, I get hit. Was the hit clean or not, I don’t know. All I know is that something hit me in the head and as a result my head hit the plexi.

 

That was Saturday and probably my last lucid memory of the weekend.  Sunday I can’t remember anything specific. I know I was at a christening. If you ask me who was there, what they were wearing , I couldn’t even tell you what the baby was called.

It’s now 23:18 GMT. 110 words in 18 minutes. I write solid and good quality press releases in less than 18 minutes.

 

I had 6 naps on Sunday. I experienced some intense short term memory loss and I kept getting people’s names wrong. I knew faces, but I couldn’t put names to them.

It is difficult to convey the inner feelings exactly, but I go from feeling energetic and happy to utterly run down and depressed.

23:31GMT 184 words. Fuck this is difficult.

I guess the over-riding feeling i’ve got at the moment is frustration at the fact that I can’t do things that come naturally. I’m frustrated at the fact that a season that has been a shambles with injuries hangs in the balance because of a minor blow. I’m angry at myself because I’m doubting myself and my commitment to things I love. I thought I was mentally stronger than that.

23:46 GMT. 268 Words…. my head hurts. I can’t write anymore.

This is just a glimpse into my mind after concussion number 5.