Concussion Recovery: Patience, Patient — Nine Months of Healing and What I Learned

0/10 Do not recommend a concussion lol, BUT if you are going through it let’s talk.

Nine months ago today I was hit by a truck. I am still healing from my concussion.

Emergency. The key in this word is emergence, and its root, merge. Sure, it’s merging rather violently — however, what comes out of it? Emergence. Something new. Something more.

Nine months is the gestation period for life. It is also the Ides of March. Quite the anniversary message. And since we don’t do coincidences or random around here, it’s time I share what I’ve learned since bringing this new me into the world.

AMERICA’S HEALTHCARE SYSTEM: THE GOOD NEWS AND THE HARD TRUTH

America’s healthcare system is broken and in need of a redo. However, America is full of amazing healers doing their best under a cruel, artificial system. So many wonderful healers. So many people who care. So many people hindered by middlemen. It’s a crime against humanity. I proceed…

CONCUSSION 101: THE CLASS I NEVER WANTED BUT APPARENTLY NEEDED

Early on, a family friend told me about Sarah Polley’s journey — three years of healing her brain injury. A friend who’d gone through a horrific crash several years ago told me things that helped her in her process, both the physical effects and how she manages it today. My lawyer told me about a timeline of healing he’s seen in clients, ranging from three months, to nine months, to long-term care.

I immediately dismissed all of that. I’d be fine. Nine months? Please. Sarah Polley was another person — her story had nothing to do with me. I’m fine. I’d be fine in a week.

Let me tell you: all those tips were invaluable. Because power thinking is not what works with an injury. With trauma. They take time. Patience. That is the most important note that all of them were telling me, even as I pushed it away. It is what helped me as each day I realized I was not yet healed. Near and far, people I didn’t even know helped me in this surreal process. Especially since our capitalist world demands fast results — and as Carly Simon sang, I haven’t got time for the pain (which is obviously why it’s all collapsing).

I am writing this to help someone going through this — whether themselves or a loved one.

HERE ARE THINGS I LEARNED THAT HELPED ME

Natural things I wish had been in one place:

Rest. First and above all, rest and sleep. Not the capitalist kind where you feel guilty about it. The real kind. The horizontal, lights off, phone down, eyes closed, do not pass go kind. Where you sleep for maybe eight hours a day (I did this for months. I know.) Your brain is healing and it needs every bit of energy you have to do that. Give it.

Reiki. I am a Reiki healer and I will tell you that energy healing is real and it helped me enormously. Reiki works with the your energy field to release blockages and support healing — physical, emotional, energetic. If you can find a good practitioner, do it. (I have many I follow on my IG! And if you are going through this and want a session, reach out.) It is one of the most gentle and powerful things I know. Our mind and energy are it. Others helping with theirs can help you heal. (Bananas, fine, lol, but it works, so…)

Acupuncture. I wanted it and couldn’t find one here in Phoenix — which, universe, fix that please — but I know from experience it works and I would have used it throughout recovery had I been able to. If you have access to a good acupuncturist, use them.

Chiropractic. My chiropractor was essential. A concussion is also a neck and spine injury and that physical component needs care. Find someone good.

Cognitive therapy. This one surprised me. It’s not talk therapy — it’s retraining your brain to do the things it used to do automatically. It is humbling and it works. It’s magic I say (and also something we should be funding way more in research.)

Trauma counseling. Because this is trauma. Your nervous system went through something. Treat it accordingly.

And above all — patience. Which, as the title of this piece suggests, I did not come to easily. lol. Progress over perfection.

THE MIND’S EYE: BRAIN, PRESENCE, AND WHAT A CONCUSSION REALLY TEACHES YOU

First, let’s talk brain — the mind, and presence. All things this concussion has reminded me of (pun intended).

This experience has taught me a lot, and as I am still healing and in it, I wanted to share my insights. Because they are things worth knowing without having to go through what I have. (I highly recommend reading Oliver Sacks.)

WHERE I WAS WHEN I WAS HIT

Kabbalah means to receive. Its main tenet is that we are receivers, and what it imparts is “mind over matter.” It is repeated in every new moon connection, embedded in every story we learn from, and is the guiding principle of the wisdom. We have the power. We can change things. Always. Full stop.

I start there because that is what I have been immersed in for the past 20 years. Why I have studied it for over 20 years is because the wisdom rings true — and while it is also challenging, the truth, aka love, is unfailing. The idea is that we can change any matter and alter what is happening. That is life. Doing it, knowing it, living it — that’s the journey. That’s why our teachers and the people we surround ourselves with are crucial. If our mental state and beliefs hold the key to our inner world and actions, our surroundings directly affect that. (So too our music. Listen to songs about being broke and unloved and guess what happens. lol. Music is mantra work, after all.)

I was hit by a truck when I was doing everything “right.” I was meeting the world where I am and also creating what I wanted. I was setting boundaries and having mercy where it was hard. My intuition was in alignment and I had made some hard decisions that I knew were right — and in that way they weren’t hard. That’s the thing with alignment. It feels right, even when it’s hard. I was doing what was best for me, and while it wasn’t everything I wanted, it was getting me there. I felt it. Let’s do this.

I was visiting my mother in Arizona. I knew no one here except for her and her few friends. I do love Phoenix and this area — I’ve been glad to have a reason to come here for almost 20 years. The land and sky are beyond, the energy is desert magic, and the people are wonderful. It is beautiful. Full stop. However, I know no one and have no personal life here. lol.

It was Father’s Day (my father is dead), and I was driving to get ingredients to make my single mother a Father’s Day meal. Part of coming home more was to be closer to people I love and to do things like this. My mother and I have always been close, and though we have had our challenges, we have become so much closer for dealing with them. It was in this spirit I was home. I was happy to be here to do something for her.

THE ASTROLOGY OF IT: SATURN, CHIRON, AND THE COSMIC CONTEXT

A note on home. I was in my Saturn in Pisces transit — and for me, Pisces is my 4th house, while Saturn in Cancer is my 8th house. I also have Chiron in Aries, which is currently activated. And Jupiter in Pisces in my 3rd house. This means my sense of home had been up for grabs — where is it, and what does it mean? It also means my identity and sense of self were under scrutiny: who am I, my sense of belonging in the world, my family, my belief in myself, and my personal fire to take up space and shine my own light. It also touches relationship to my mother and father, connection to the cosmos, and my intimate connections to others. That was where my work lay.

All that — before the crash.

THE CRASH

I was running an errand for the lasagna. And then I heard a crash and saw white and stars and smelled the impact. I was in the middle of an intersection. I waited for the hits to stop. I knew then it was over and I could begin to crawl out. I was shaking like a leaf. This continued for several hours.

The firefighters were heroes — there fast and doing their best to help and clear the major intersection. It was early afternoon and 115 degrees. No shade anywhere.

At the hospital I was doing the nurses’ astrology charts. I noticed my toes were a gorgeous pink and was grateful my mom and I had gotten pedicures a day or so before. It seemed surreal to me that I was in a hospital bed looking at my toes. I didn’t see this view coming. My mom and her friend sat at the end of the bed as I got tests. The doctor came in and made a joke about almost having to fire someone for messing up my chart — she couldn’t believe my age. I laughed. Everything was foggy. Several hours later I had stopped shaking. I’d never been given fluids in an emergency room before.

I would be fine, I kept telling myself. I was ok.

I was not ok.

WHAT CONCUSSION RECOVERY ACTUALLY LOOKS LIKE

I slept like a baby — 18 hours a day — for months. I took a long nap every day for five months. Even now I go to bed by 8pm if I’ve had a full day.

It was four months before I could blow dry my hair. I did it twice in a few weeks and that was it.

Managing my energy — and by that I mean my thoughts — was what I needed to do. For the first few months I could only get dressed and go to doctors. Then I could handle a short call too. If not a call then a shower. I was only with my mother.

I was foggy. That’s the word I kept using. I had no ability to say no. I was in my blob era, as I say now. I just did. I didn’t question doctors. Analysis was not really a thing with a scrambled head. I wanted to get better and they were doctors. I trusted them all. I quickly had a primary doctor, a chiropractor, a trauma counselor, a cognitive therapist, and a physical therapist. I tried to find an acupuncturist but no one I knew here could recommend one — and I still want one.

My first thought at the doctors was: how is football legal? How did those men get hit week after week, and in practice in between? It’s barbaric. They are not ok. I’m not ok and it was one hit, them? Oh no. Illegal.

I wasn’t mad — only emotional coming out of it. The accident made me cry more. My family has anxiety issues, so you can imagine my wonderful mother was also struggling — seeing your grown, opinionated daughter become baby-like had to be terrifying. Her distress didn’t help.

I noticed right away a change that hasn’t really returned. I didn’t care the way I used to. I couldn’t.

I couldn’t.

I didn’t have the space, bandwidth, or temperament to absorb it. Has this happened to you? I didn’t want her to be mad or scared or upset, but I also didn’t make it my job to fix it the way I always had.

I turned over and slept.

It’s a hard line to explain — it’s like I was watching it from a distance and felt sad, but then: oh, that’s sad, I’m sorry for her, goodnight. I had to sleep. No other option.

Something had been cut off inside me. Strange, no?

I keep saying to doctors, even now, I’m different in my mind still, but they want something quantifiable and since our systems aren’t built for this (systemic U.S. healthcare change needed!) I work on my connecting with energy healers, knowing this is part of the healing and it’s ok.

Emergencies have emergence. Healing is not static. It’s in process. Oddly though, I’m not afraid. Coming online slowly, emerging, is happening. Patience. And gratitude. As flawed as our corporate health system is, it is so very advanced.

NINE MONTHS LATER: WHAT HAS CHANGED

It’s nine months and I am different. I am not the same bandwidth yet, though I can do more things in a day. I can wake up and think and wash my face and make something to eat and clean it up and answer emails and write articles and schedule meetings and make new plans for work and have conversations and make more food and drive a car and have physical therapy and cognitive therapy and decide I need a new doctor and clean up after myself and laugh and read books and make plans for the future and walk up steps and carry heavier things and reach up high and do my hair.

What this has taught me is that we don’t appreciate how much our brain does in a day. The myriad calculations it makes just to leave the house. To pack a bag and bring our things, have matching clothes, and plan a trip.

We don’t appreciate how much our brain does in a day. How when driving we calculate everything around us — our speed, the light ahead, the car coming up fast behind us, the cars in front, the adjacent lanes, the car on the other side — because we need to know what they are doing.

All that in one second. And then again. And again. And again.

And that’s without the radio on and singing along.

We don’t appreciate how much our brain does in a day. And we don’t appreciate how much energy each one of those things takes. And putting it all together.

Presence. Appreciation.

ON HEALING: YOU WILL NOT BE THE SAME — AND THAT’S THE POINT

I am different. The doctors want me to fit into their boxes — omfg, capitalist medicine. Even as they know that’s not possible, because people don’t work that way.

I used the word foggy for so long. When that fog lifted around month six, I was still not me. This was strange. I’d been injured before — whiplash, a bad accident — but never with this concussion severity and cervical vertebrae involvement. Shit.

It’s scary. But I’ve also felt held.

I’m not the same. Friends and family want me to be. So far I’m not. Am I better? I can do so much more, so in those ways yes — but I am also not at full capacity, and I am also different.

In invisible ways, things have been cut from my mind. From me. I am more calm and less in a hurry. I don’t need to be understood by everyone. My anxiety is almost at zero. My drive is there, but it’s more about myself and what I want. Less outward-facing. I care for others more — I feel people more — but it’s less general and more specific. I care more about whoever is in front of me at the moment. A cashier. My mom. A doctor. I’m more present.

A family friend who is a therapist asked me: if you were never the same again, would that be okay?

I said yes. And that is true.

A NEW NORMAL

Healing carries the idea that we return to who we were. Nope. Even the doctors say: we want you back to where you were when it happened. I corrected them all: nope. I want to be better. Because I won’t be the same — I’ve been through something — but I can be better. That’s still the plan. (Classic Mars in Scorpio ambition and Sag Stellium lol.)

And yes, better means healed. And it also means different. That’s not only ok, but what’s happening in the process of emergency: emerging.

Healing changes you. Remember that.

And if you are caring for someone going through this, be mindful of that too. You will be changed as well.

Bisous, Mes Stars. — Leah