Some Ramblings

I finished the book “The Humpty Dumpty Syndrome” last night. I could not stop reading this read. I read it during commercials of my favorite shows, when it wasn’t my turn during games, when I didn’t have to devote any attention to anything else. What is funny is that this book, of all of the others that I have read I related to this one the least. Throughout reading this book, I gained better understanding of what the last 20 years must have been like for the man who lent me the book. It also made me so very thankful for Randy’s attitude during this time and thankful for how much he has recovered in the last 7 months. Many people with head injury don’t realize the deficits they are left with. Though Randy feels the same inside, he is aware of the deficits he has, which has greatly helped his recovery process. If you are not aware of a problem, you cannot fix it. Randy being aware of the deficits gives him the opportunity to find ways of solving them. There are of course times that being aware of the deficits doesn’t necessarily help. For example, Randy knowing that his memory is faulty didn’t prevent an angry episode that Randy had because he didn’t remember one conversation we had had a day or so earlier. The lack of memory of that conversation led him to believe he was lied to. It wasn’t until the next day that he was able to take a step back and realize that his memory had failed him.

One thing that reading this book made me realize, though, is how much I do for Randy. The step-mother in the book was always working on improving independence of her stepson throughout the book. When she would go grocery shopping, she would give him a list of 2 or 3 things and send him off on his own. It took him years go get to the point that he could maneuver around the store and find the items that he needed. I am sure that Randy is functioning enough to find his way around the store and do his own shopping, but he has not really gotten the chance to do so because it never really occurred to me to even let him try ~ it was just easier for me to do everything.

All of the books I have read have some similarities amongst all of their differences. One common thread is the family members of the TBI survivor start out with hopes and beliefs that their loved one can and will return to their former self, and by the end of the book all come to the realization that the TBI survivor is a new form of the old person and things will never go back to the same. My mind has come to this realization, but my heart has had a harder time of letting go. I am thankful that so much of Randy did remain “intact”. He didn’t have major personality changes that can occur with head injury. I, though, have never had much patience and often find it hard to deal with the not knowing how much Randy will “recover” over time.

Another common thread of the books I have read has been the authors’ dealing with the question of whether or not God permitted the loved one to suffer a TBI in order to teach that person or family members some life lesson or to use the tragedy for some greater purpose. My thoughts on this ~ I believe that every decision we make leads to some sort of outcome. As in the case of the stepson in “The Humpty Dumpty Syndrome”, his decision to drive home after a night of partying and of having little sleep led to the outcome of him losing control of his car and crashing into a tree. This decision resulted in his head injury that changed his life. It affected him and all of those that he came into contact with after ~ from the immediate family and friends whose lives had to change drastically because of the injury, to the team of people who helped him recover to the point where he is now. Sometimes the decisions we make affect others more negatively than they do us. With Randy’s case, someone made the decision to drive too fast and wasn’t paying attention to traffic and someone else made the decision to drive in a lane they weren’t suppose to be in. Their decisions resulted in Randy’s injury. What we do with what has happened is up to us. I believe we are all connected and our choices can affect those we don’t even know. I believe that God sometimes steps in and change the outcomes and I don’t know why he didn’t in this case. He did say he would never give us anything we couldn’t handle.