“Why Did You Let the Doctors Save Me?” She Cried

“I’m a burden.” she said.

Words a mother never wants to hear come out of her child’s mouth.

I spoke to a friend about our trials this week and she wrote, “I can only imagine how difficult it was to hear someone you love more than yourself ask you why you let them save her.” Yes, it was a dagger in my heart. I felt and still feel completely crushed when I think about those words.

This was an extremely hard week filled with tears. On Veronica’s workout journey and creating a friendship with her trainer, something completely unexpected happened in Veronica’s injured brain.  The love and friendship she felt for her trainer turned into an obsession where Veronica lost control of her thoughts and feelings and has no idea how to regain them. She quickly fell deeply in love with her trainer, looking at her and seeing in her everything Veronica wants to be. We will call her Jenni. She is beautiful inside and out, healthy, and so strong in body, personality, and spirit. And she is funny, and mentally stable.

A humorous light and fun social relationship soon turned into an unhealthy attachment where Veronica put her every bit of happiness into where she was with Jenni and how her communication flowed with Jenni. Veronica became very obsessive and began making up scenarios in her mind about Jenni caring about other people more than she cared about Veronica. The things Veronica was thinking were untrue. If Jenni did not answer her texts right away, Veronica would mistakenly believe Jenni hated her. None of this had to do with their relationship at all. Veronica was overwhelmed by feelings she did not understand and did not know how to react to. Even when Veronica was training with Jenni for an hour four days a week, Veronica got to the point where she would spend most of her time crying because she wanted Jenni all to herself. This is much like an immature behavior a teenager might have in a friendship. But as many know, Veronica will always be 15 years old in many ways. 15 is such a hard age full of insecurities, jealousy, AND hormones. And that is where Veronica is stuck. This is through no fault of her own. The injury to her frontal lobe is severe and once injured, it will always be injured. The question is now, can Veronica learn to have these feelings and be able to react differently, in a more healthy manner. There is no guarantee that all the medicine and therapy in the world will be able to change this. But we are sure going to try.

In case you do not know, our frontal lobe is responsible for our executive functions. These functions refer to cognitive, or thinking skills, including the capacity to plan, organize, initiate, self-monitor, and to control one’s responses. As a whole, the frontal lob is responsible for memory, emotions, impulse control, problem solving, social interaction, and motor function. Source: https://www.health.qld.gov.au/abios/asp/bfrontal  When our neurons are torn, shredded, or stretched, they may heal and may even grow new pathways, but never like they were before injury. The result of frontal lobe injury are not limited to, but may include: loss of flexibility in thinking and persistence of a single idea or behavior (perseverance, leading to obsessiveness), mood fluctuations, difficulty with problem solving, difficulty inhibiting or controlling a response or impulse, changes in social behavior, and changes in personality. Brain Maps Frontal Lobes 12 July 2022.

We were told by doctors after Veronica’s severe brain injury, that her frontal lobe was now like scrambled eggs. Things are all mixed up in there for Veronica. The fact that she can function at all is a miracle. But her brain’s crossed, mixed-up wiring makes having healthy relationships difficult for Veronica.

Thinking about how to help this situation without Veronica having to quit training, yet put a distance, that will hopefully only need to be temporary, between she and Jenni, we decided Veronica would have to switch trainers if she still wants to continue the fabulous health and fitness journey she is on. Veronica cried because she is sorry for upsetting Jenni and not being able to be the good “normal” friend she always wanted to be for Jenni. Yesterday I heard one of the saddest things I ever heard Veronica say. “Why did you let the doctor’s save me.” Veronica feels like if she cannot even know how to be friends with someone, why is she even here. She has sunken into such deeply depressive times during the past month, I have been afraid to leave her alone at times.

I am a proactive mom, and I am on a mission to help my girl grow, learn, and be happy.

We now have her neuropsychiatrist, psychiatrist, and therapist on the job to help Veronica find herself, whom she has lost throughout this ordeal. The past month has been the worst. To make it all even worse, the mood lability that brain injured people suffer is not being helped by Veronica’s mood stabilizer medication. Mood lability is one of the most difficult parts of a brain injury. She is going off two unhelpful medications and going on one different one starting today. And her therapist is going to be working on teaching Veronica about boundaries, an ability that has gone away since her injury. Even in a grocery store she will stand close to a man’s face and take a big sniff and tell him he smells delicious, if she thinks so. We have helped Veronica learn many things over the years, but there are still a few more to work on with the help of professionals. Yes, we have brought professionals into the picture and into Veronica’s life many times over the years. Sometimes what they try to teach Veronica sticks, and many times it is forgotten.

So, this is how I dealt with Veronica’s severe depression and the saddest comment I ever heard come out of her mouth about not understanding why we let the doctor’s save her.

Yesterday, the first thing I decided was, if any day in my life I should take one day at a time, today is the day. It is all I can handle to think about. One moment, many hard things happening, many blessings present. When Veronica’s life is hard, my life is hard. We do share an umbilical cord, you know. I sat next to Veronica on the couch as she sobbed, and told her we are still blessed. We woke up. We are still capable of learning. We live in a nice house. We have beautiful friends in our lives that love us. Our family is always here for us. Shit happens, things hurt. But with these good things, we can get to tomorrow. We have been through worse things. This is what I am teaching Veronica and filling her head with as she goes through an extremely painful time in her life. I keep telling her, “We got this. Life will get good again. It always does.”

This morning I woke up to Veronica sitting at our dining table. When I came toward her to say good morning, she flashed me a beautiful hopeful smile and said, “Today is a better day. When I woke up the sun was shining. I have been thinking about our blessings. I have a lot of work to do, but it is not like I haven’t worked hard before.” And we got dressed and went for a walk in the sunshine and talked about the positives in our life and how this will work out because things always do.

If you would like to learn more about how we manage living with traumatic brain injuries, please read my book titled, A Miracle a Day, One Day at a Time: Hope After Traumatic Brain Injury.

There is always hope if we are alive and willing to try.

You can buy my book right from my website. Go to Menu and press on Book. It will show up on Amazon. If you do read my book, please write an honest review afterwards.

Have a beautiful day full of sunshine and hope.

See you next week.