Living with Traumatic Brain Injury

Dec 16, 1990 %u2013 A drunk driver returning from Monroe, WA passed out, crossed the centerline & hit my truck head-on near the Wayside Chapel by Sultan, WA%u2026%u2026%u2026I feel like I went from 41 yrs old to 101 yrs old in that moment. The uninsured drunk driver immediately ran off to California for a couple years changing his name on everything he owned so he couldn%u2019t be sued, thus he never paid one penny of my ever-continuing huge medical bills because the lawyers couldn’t find any ‘deep pockets’.

After the wreck, I was in surgery 20 hours, comatose several weeks (missed Desert Storm, coming out of the coma in time to see soldiers returning) & was in the hospital 4 months & in a wheelchair a couple years. In the wreck, I broke my neck (C-1), severed my aorta, got a TBI (traumatic brain injury) and my left leg was broken in 20 places & I was not expected to live. As a single Mom with 3 kids & since my insurance maxed out, I%u2019ve had to sell off most everything that had been my planned retirement income just to pay medical bills. It is extremely difficult for me to walk, talk, get up out of a chair, carry anything (because my one useable hand is busy with the quad cane) or even roll over in bed%u2026%u2026..pretty much every single thing I try to do. What used to be so simple & routine, now take lots of thought & planning to achieve. And since I live alone (& can’t afford ‘help’) my exercise is just doing my ADL’s. (How am I ever going to do THAT?)

Some repercussions of the wreck…. I was right handed for the 41 yrs before the wreck but now have to do everything with ONLY my left hand & as a result have rheumatoid arthritis in my left shoulder, elbow, wrist & fingers from overuse & take 9 expensive meds a day for that. My neck loudly %u2018pops%u2019 from the C-1 break in the wreck & I HAVE TO HAVE a roll pillow behind my head in a car for extended rides. From my paralyzed vocal cord, I yell-to-whisper so get hoarse very quickly, have enormous troubles swallowing, snore, but not because my mouth is open but from my 1/2 vocal cord is ‘just there’, I cannot %u2018burp%u2019 till I open my mouth, then they expel on their own.
Have apparently had body tremors for years caused by my TBI or the C-1 tho I wasn%u2019t even aware of them till Easter 07; I’d thought the ‘earthquakes’ I was feeling was from construction, airplanes overhead or traffic or? But on Easter when I awoke to tremendous tremors & there was nothing going on that day, I realized they were in me!! So I went to a neurologist & sure enough, they were caused by my TBI!!! So 9 more meds/day were added to the 30 I already took!! For 15 years I had leg spasms in my right paralyzed leg; they occurred every 13 seconds and happened about 20 times or more. But now - 18 years later - after my knee became fully hyper-extended, the spasms have nearly stopped! Now they occur - maybe - a few times a month. Similarly, when my toes on my right foot started bending under, especially the big toe, it was incredibly painful for years. But once it got fully bent, it quit hurting entirely! So I wonder about the Drs feeling the need to surgically straighten them%u2026%u2026 It took me 17 years to learn how to zip-up a coat that I was wearing, tho I still have to sit down to do it. I sit on the toilet to dress - and it takes me nearly an hour to do everything 1 handed, sometimes longer. I can%u2019t %u2019carry%u2019 so either move things as far as I can on the floor, throwing them further, then move up to them, plant my quad cane & bend over to pick them up again, then throw them or move them another foot or so, pick up my cane & move again, etc till I get to where I want to go. Am essentially incontinent since I have no feeling in my stomach. I never %u2018feel hungry%u2019 or %u2018feel full%u2019 or like I %u2018have to%u2019 go to the bathroom. I cannot cry tears (and sure miss that!!!) I gage my bathroom needs similar to how I %u2018potty trained%u2019 my 3 kids; I always make sure to %u2018go%u2019 upon waking, before I go anywhere away from my house & before I go to bed plus I keep track of how much I drink & %u2018go%u2019 periodically throughout the day. Even tho I take water pills for my b/p, the noise of running water activates my bladder so I%u2018m sure to caution house guests about that.

And then there%u2019s the stigma of being crippled%u2026.I have to ride DART for transportation everywhere since I can%u2019t drive. My finances are ruined because I%u2019ve had to sell off everything that had been my planned retirement at 41 yrs old to pay my medical bills since the drunk driver had no insurance & mine maxed out early-on when I was in the initial surgery 20 hours, the weeks I was comatose and in intensive care & the 4 months I was hospitalized. I live alone & cannot afford %u2018help%u2019. I was a single Mom of 3 kids for 28 of the last 38 years. My youngest was 5 & in kindergarten when the wreck happened, his brother was 18 & a Senior in high school, my daughter on her own. So now that they%u2019re grown & on their own, its lots easier. Plus when the wreck happened, I had a 7 day a week business that I had to sell after 16 years to pay bills.

I%u2019ve often wondered the past 18 years if it would be worse to be born crippled or to get hurt & become crippled later in life. I%u2019ve come to the conclusion that its better (if there is a %u2018better%u2018??) to be like I am. At least I know what the result is & how to do it normally. I just have to figure out how-on-earth I can achieve it now, one handed. I%u2019m thankful that I%u2019ve regained my thinking (that was seriously affected by the TBI tho I still have memory problems from it) and can at least figure those things out, thank you, thank you Lord! Bur I have always, every single minute the last 18 years, wish I’d died in the wreck, like was expected. Humans show more ‘humanity’ to animals by putting them out of their misery, yet I’m supposed to be glad that I lived. I don’t see how……………..This is living?