Today is the one year anniversary of the eye surgery I had to correct my vision as a result of my multiple brain injuries in March 2014.  I’ve been driving for a year and I’ve gotten more comfortable in the car.

I’m still trying to navigate how to effectively deal with the pain from the injuries I had. I have throbbing pain on the left side of my brain (where my shunt used to be) Additionally, the shunt causes pain as well and has a mind of its own. There’s throbbing in the back of my head by my cerebellum (from the chiari malformation from the shunt over-draining from 2009-2014) Tingling on the top right and left sides of my head. There are pains from the distal catheter portion of my shunt in my stomach/abdomen.  The distal catheter pumps csf fluid into my abdomen, it burns. I hear the shunt too, only in my right, ear where I am tone deaf.

Pain medication does nothing to alleviate my symptoms. The neurologist I’ve been seeing since 2014, thinks the pain I feel in my head is because I’m depressed. I know this is not the case. The medication I was given to treat my ‘depression’ does nothing to alleviate my symptoms.  The good news is he was concerned about me when I saw him earlier this month. I’m convinced when I see him again in June, he’ll finally see my symptoms are not from “depression’ and are a direct result of the trauma I experienced in 2014.

Signed copies of the film based on my brain injuries is available here.

Anniversaries can be both weird or not so weird. Today it’s been two years since my multiple brain injuries. I consider myself very fortunate that I didn’t develop hydrocephalus ex-vacuo as a result of my injuries. The first anniversary was a challenge to get through as I still had double vision and was anticipating my upcoming eye muscle surgery on March 19, 2015.  My misaligned eyes was a reminder of what had happened to me.  However, the second anniversary was easier mostly due to my eyesight being corrected and I’m feeling better than I was last year (when I still had numbness in my muscles and tendons. )

Still trying figure out a way to deal with the pain I feel as a result of the injuries I had.  Since 2014, I’ve had pain in the back of my head by my cerebellum due to the chiari malformation I acquired from the shunt revision in 2009.  I also have slit ventricle syndrome as a result of my shunt over draining between 2009-2014.  I feel pain in the nerves and the ventricles due to the damage and my body still searching for the shunt to be on the left side of my brain. I’ve tried sleeping on my right side, which has helped a little with the pain issues on the left side of my brain.

I’ll be celebrating my injuries as a second birthday all month. In 2014 I was in rehab from March 11 – April 5.  Today I went to the movies and it was nice to get out of the house.  I’m not able to work right now and I’m home 90% of the week. Things will be this way until I start vocational rehab sometime this summer.