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Very imaginative title eh?

You might have noticed that I took my longest break ever from OD over the last two weeks. I’ve never had that big a gap in my diary, except for the couple of months lost in the great hacking of 04. I didn’t have anything that I wanted to write. In fact, I didn’t come to Open Diary at all for a while

The reason I didn’t was because of depression. Another one of my cat friends died. That was the cherry on top of the neuropsychological tests I took in August, 14 years and more after I wrecked my car on the Morrison Bridge in 1998. I have a four inch stack of papers from that – hospital reports and etc. and buried in that stack of paper are two neuropsychological tests I took in 98 and 2000.

The tests then were not so good; I hit my head really hard in the wreck and damaged my brain (and was afraid to say or admit that for 14 years). I used to think that brain damage made you an idiot, and I wasn’t an idiot, I thought. The test results in 98 and 00 were worded positively, and I hung on to that for many years, but they were positive in that I was not expected to live or to know my own name and expressed cautious optimism that since I survived the wreck, that I might well be able to "rebuild" the shattered axions in my brain, reconnecting nerves.

I was tested in 1998 and in 2000, and in August of this year, when I applied to Vocational Rehabilitation for help in finding a job. I couldn’t work for 4 years after the wreck – my stamina and mental fortitude were damaged in the wreck, and I need, it looks like, regular breaks and rests to get through a day of work. That bus driving job I had last year, with its 10 to 14 hour days, was way more than I could stand, and, in thinking about it, I come to the conclusion that maybe there is an angel looking out for me. 3 times I scraped my bus on the right inside of a turn I was making. Only in the last time were there any people on the bus, but that car I hit was completely destroyed.

I’ve been counting the strikes against me. Some I’ve made for myself and some just are. I’m 50. which is not too old, except if you’re looking for a job. I’ve been fired from 5 of the last 6 jobs I’ve held. The brain damage makes it hard to learn new things or to learn a new job, and as I mentioned, my stamina is less than it was and much less than "it should be".

The biggest strike, to me, and I will never tell an employer this, is that reading the results of these three tests, I have made no progress – the things that were ‘defective" in 98 and 00 are still not right and never, it looks like, will be. I’ve lost 30 points on the IQ scale.

That is my car and the pole I hit on the bridge. I didn’t do ALL of that damage; they had to cut me out of the wreck to save me. I made a point out of finding out who pulled me out and when they worked, and I went to the fire station when those guys were on duty to say "Thank you for saving my life". They seemed to take great joy in showing me the tools that they had used to cut open the car, and they showed me pictures of the car (but not of Me) and told me how they had to cut the roof off and how they had to use "the jaws of life" to fold the metal away from my trapped left leg. They told me it was a good thing I ran into that pole; otherwise it would have been right into the river for me and the end of me too.

I was in no shape to go swimming.  4 broken ribs, 2 collapsed lungs, a fractured left leg, internal damages, and the brain damage, not to mention the coma I was suddenly in meant if I had gone in the river, I wouldn’t have made it out by myself.

I woke up in a hospital six weeks later, not knowing my name – or being very unsure that what they were calling me was MY name. I couldn’t walk, and at first they kept me in a diaper – I couldn’t do that by myself either. I remember being VERY confused and afraid. "Brain damage???" I think I put a great deal of effort into denying that, and it worked for many years… but it’s inescapable and undeniable.

I know what I know – I didn’t lose EVERYTHING. and some stuff has come back, but learning new stuff, or understanding what I see when I see it, are two hard hard things for me now. They were cautiously optimistic when I left the hospital, but then, they expected me to die or to be a vegetable, and that I wasn’t encouraged people to think, "oh, he’ll be alright".

Sorry, it didn’t work out that way.  Dealing with it, as I had to, alone, it didn’t and won’t work out.  The insurance ran out six months after the wreck and left me alive, yes, but less than capable of a "normal" life.  I applied, for the third time, for Disability, in September. and I hope they don’t jerk me around again; I’ve tried to make it by myself and have not done at all well at it.

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I didn’t want to write something all depressing, so I didn’t write anything, but I have to get it out.  NO progress on recovery, except my left ankle doesn’t Hurt any more.  It did for more than a year after the wreck – leg trapped in the bent car’s sheet metal – and while that’s improved, I think it’s safe to say that after 14 years, my brain is NOT going to improve.  I’m alive, but this life of poverty and neglect is getting old fast.

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