We are strangers to ourselves

Today's exciting instalment is a sorta sad one (to an extent) but I feel honesty is something I certainly must bring in documenting my journey.

It is a journey that has been full of ups and downs, which has honestly been the biggest struggle in my life, but as I approach my Consultation at Sheffield Hallam hospital (Wednesday 25th) about my Stereotactic Surgery, I think its a good time to remind myself how far I have come mentally, or not in some cases.

I have never dealt with change very well in life, its one of my many personality faults/traits, which has progressed deep into my adult life.

The Oxford dictionary defines change as:

“Make or become different”

Which is certainly something that I can relate to in my journey with my brain injury.

The earliest memory I can currently recall of change is a rather silly one. I had a pair of favourite trainers as a young lad (Pink, yes Pink!!) ones that I was convinced helped me run faster, they were just cheap ones from Shoezone in Tamworth (a long gone budget shop) with nothing particularly special about them. But I bloody loved those trainers, I played out in them everyday, whether football (in a car park, those were the days!) or just Accy 1-2-3 (a council estate version of hide and seek) or riding my bike down ridiculously steep hills I used them faithful pink/purple trainers. I can distinctly remember being devastated when they had to be thrown out due to being totally wrecked by too much wear! More so when me and my Ma went back to the shop to find they no longer stocked the mythical trainers, how the hell was I gonna run fast anymore?!

That is my earliest memory I can recall at this point of change, but why bring up this non interesting tale of change you ask? (or not ask)

Because if there is one thing this journey has been about thus far it is change.

Remember change is to “Make or become different” and this continues even now, and will until the end of my days on this spinning rock in the cosmos I assume. I know that further change is ahead of me in the next year or so and I immediately was/am terrified of the prospect, but why?

I am a man of habit, as proved by my many years of relentless smoking/partying and general disregard for my own health (luckily something I have changed in the past couple of years or so)
                                      

Pictured above is me in my cooler more care free days! Ironically i have changed a lot since then!

I abhor change, I really bloody do. I like order and habit. It brings a solid base to my life that I have never quite been able to replicate in any other way. It brings comfort, peace and ease to my mind. I know big change is a coming to my life soon and still my first immediate reaction was to fear it straight away, rather than embrace it, but in a sense the human body is constantly changing mostly without your own knowledge. Writing this blog reminded me of this interesting fact on the human skin.

“Throughout your life, your skin will change constantly, for better or worse. In fact, your skin will regenerate itself approximately every 27 days “

So in a sense the outer external husk of a human body is regenerated or changed every 27 days. So I have been living with change my whole life without ever really noticing it. But internally, or rather emotionally, its not every 27 days that you get a new you!

There are these pesky things called memories, which as humans we attach importance and emotion to, even to the point of thinking that there is not a chance of making new memories to replace these old ones.

Yes, you read that correctly, your brain actually replaces memories http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2015/03/21/how-your-brain-deletes-trauma.html

“The process of recall causes people to lose other memories, meaning that our attempts to remember certain things lead to the forgetting of others.”

So I guess Homer was right all along 

Which means my avoidance of change is a silly thing really, change is as inevitable as death, taxes and my love of Paul Scholes.

Pictured above is probably the best footballer of his generation Paul Scholes

Why fight change? why fight against the current of the sea of change? I have no bloody clue why I do, but I do know that slowly but surely I am beginning to get better at not fighting it and embracing what happens and trying to make the best of a bad hand.

At probably my lowest point in my diary (Wednesday 22nd October 2014) I wrote:

“I hope one day I will recover from this, but I can't see it happening. I have lost hope. I have spent so much of my life fighting/struggling that I don't know if I have any fight left in me. I feel broken!”

I still feel a bit broken to this day which is natural as my brain is still a long way from being fixed, but I have changed considerably since that day. I have got stronger, emotionally and mentally. I have so much more fight and fire in my belly (and its a big bloody belly!) that its hard to see the person who wrote that anymore.

And that is the positive thing of my old friend change, which is to “Make or become different” there is always the possibility that change can be a good thing, so I guess I better start embracing it!