Life With a TBI

"Some minds seem almost to create themselves, springing up under every disadvantage and working their solitary but irresistible way through a thousand obstacles." - Washington Irving

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FgtHvBF4t-E

Last week I had interviews for several doctoral programs. One of the interviewers asked about my TBI, and I explained my injury and symptoms. He looked at me curiously, cocked his head to the side and said, "Hmmm, I guess you're one of the 8%." I must have raised and eyebrow or something, and he clarified. "Most people get better in the first six weeks or so."

Oh.

I couldn't decide if he was implying that he didn't believe me or just making an innocent comment.

Then again, in psychology, no comment is an innocent comment.

So I've been doing a bit of research on lingering symptoms, and recovery in general. The link above is to a video that is quite good, showing a range of after effects and a variety of people who are living with this type of injury.

Brain injuries, if they are not profound, really are invisible injuries, but they are most definitely there, even if they are only perceived by those of us who have them.

Sing Out, Louise!

"He who sings frightens away his ills." Miguel de Cervantes, Don Quixote

As I've mentioned before, my brain hears things differently since the injury. It was one of the first things I notices after the accident. When I was feeling well enough, my family took me out to dinner, ostensibly to celebrate my survival, and I was looking forward to a night out after being cooped up in the house alternating ice and heat packs for several days. The first thing I noticed after being seated was that I couldn't follow any of the conversations at the table. The second thing I noticed was that I couldn't NOT focus on the background music, or, more precisely, the music that was background for everyone else at the table was decidedly foreground for me.

It was worse with music that contained vocals. They pulled my attention. If there was someone singing in the "background" I couldn't attend to regular spoken conversation. The obvious solution for this was to insist that everyone address me in song. Unfortunately, my family and friends are not gifted singers. I thought this new quirk was something that would eventually go away. It didn't.

Whistling is another attention grabber for me.

The irony of all this is that my husband sings and whistles constantly. It was something I loved about him prior to the accident, now, it makes me want to hit him with whatever is handy. I feel awful asking him to "stop that infernal whistling/singing", but I do. Honestly, it gets to the point where I just can't stand it. There are days when I can't even think straight with someone singing or whistling. Again, this is all tied to fatigue.

Today, I found an interesting article that is somewhat related. It involves research into rehabilitating stroke victims who have lost their ability to speak by teaching them to sing. Apparently, the area of the brain that governs speech is not the same area that controls singing. Professional singers have "over" developed "song" areas.

So did my speech area get damaged or did my song area get kicked into overdrive?

I suspect it was the speech area that got slammed since I had other speech problems, but where does the whistling fit in?

news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/8526699.stm