Concussion Recovery: Earthquake Rebuilding for The Brain?

Analytical thinking undoubtedly jumbles the process

Rocky path to recovery

I’m annoyed that my concussion recovery hasn’t been smooth, linear, easily definable, and simple. I like things I can put my mind around.

Memories out of order, intermediate ones difficult to find, and sometimes gone altogether. Everything in my head was tossed about and now feels like a pile of rubble to rebuild. Pain, sometimes in my head and sometimes from other injuries I sustained in the accident, oftentimes distracts me from recalling what I can’t remember.

This is not my first go-round with a violent blow to the head. Three and a half decades ago, I was hit by a truck, and my brain bled onto pavement that was over 100 degrees on an early July evening. I was riding my bicycle home from an all-day babysitting job without a helmet.

Back then, my brain was still developing, and it took a long time to get my personality back; my parents said I spoke without inflection for several weeks after I left the hospital, and they wondered if I would ever get my spark back. Every concussion is unique; I was sassy as ever within days of this one. Fatigue overwhelmed me then, as it does now.

I found helpful advice in dealing with the cognitive understanding of a concussion here:

Odd dreams

What fascinates me with this bout of brain-bouncing are my recent dream encounters. I usually dream with lots of ordinary music and oftentimes wake up with a song in my head, but since the accident, my dreams have included childlike, cartoonish, funny songs that don’t make any sense. When I’m in dreamland, all three of my adult children are inexplicably very young.

Additionally, I dream of people who’ve been dead for quite some time. I can’t help but feel as though all my memories are scattered and attempting to reorganize themselves logically and chronologically. They are having a difficult time doing so.

When I’m sleeping, it’s such an unexpected treat to interact with my children before those precious years flew by and to again see family and friends that have long since passed on. To have all these otherwise dusty memories fresh once again has been a surprise I don’t mind.

Has anyone else encountered similar or other interesting experiences while trying to recover from head trauma? I’d love to hear about it because objectively, I’m curious, and subjectively it would be helpful to hear about other experiences and how they resolved themselves.