Corey,
Strength doesn’t come from what you CAN do; it comes from overcoming the things you once thought you couldn’t ~ Rikki Rogers
A friend of mine posted this quote on Facebook tonight and it was just what I needed to read at the end of a VERY long day.
I write this journal to give clinical updates of your progress, but it’s also a means to process the day’s events, digest the reality of what we do each day and seek the motivational tools we’ll need to get up and do it all over again tomorrow.
Quite frankly, there have been many days I wasn’t sure how we were going to get through. Despite your progress there are days still that seem never ending.
Today was tough. You seemed to regress emotionally; your rage and violent outbursts were inconsistent and took us off guard with each new explosion. Instantly I wonder is she tired? Is she hungry? Is she disoriented? Is it just part of the TBI package?
Is it just one of those days…
Corey, I didn’t know what to do to comfort you today. I felt sad and helpless. I could sit here and have a pity party as to how hard the day was for “me” to cope emotionally but then I think of you. Your days don’t have enough adjectives to describe what you are fighting to overcome without a voice to express it.
You could have a pity party too. You could give up and no one would blame you. But what good would that do? Think of our friend who has cancer. She is trying new experimental chemos because she won’t allow herself to give up her fight yet the medication is making her sicker. Think of our friend that is caring for both his parents as one has Alzheimer’s and the other has Cancer. He still goes to work and cares for his own family every day. The list could go on.
In the grand scheme of things we are more than lucky…You are getting better; slowly but you’re making progress. Think of the thousands of patients that lose their life to TBI.
Is it exhausting? Yes. Does it seem that 24 hours is actually a week long? Yes. But take the blinders off for just 5 minutes and look beyond the 10 feet that’s in front of you. The bad days will fool you into thinking this is forever. Forever is a very long time from now. This moment in time is temporary. When you think you can’t take another minute, close your eyes, look back at all the minutes that have already passed…those minutes became hours, the hours became a day. Now take a deep breath ~ open your eyes…did you ever think you would be where you are today?
Strength doesn’t come from what you CAN do; it comes from overcoming the things you once thought you couldn’t ~ never give up and never give in…xoxo