Can I Have A New Brain Please - My Memory's Taken A Holiday

[gms1976]

I used to wish I could take my brain out and put it in a container with soothing solution. Just a rinse to get it functional again.

Gizmo, you have no idea how fabulous that sounds! And you might be onto something here. Maybe that's what we need to do. Visualization. It is known to work and it changes the perceptions of how the brain interprets things. They teach cancer patients to imagine a button in their minds to turn off the pain or to cut the blood supply to a tumor.

I'm going to lie back now and soak my brain in a wonderful cooling solution and imagine I'm in the middle of a peaceful green forest and all I can hear is the sound of a stream, the birds in the trees and the distant sigh of the wind...:sleep:

By the way, the hug offer is open this end too. If you ever need one, just holler! I think the best thing we can do is to support and raise each other up as I don't think there are many people who don't have PTSD who understand.

 

[Deleted member 12723]

Hi- I'll take those hugs. Your right, it takes a ptsd sufferer to understand having shared so much common ground. Thanks I will try the visualization too. Wish me luck.

 

[gms1976]

I honestly had the most awful Friday ever! I'm already behind with my work because I'm slow (thank you molasses brain) and I'm doing the work of someone else who had a planned surgery and now one of my bosses has decided we have to get up on the patient floors (I work for a hospital in the QM dept) and help prep with an upcoming state hospital survey. We have to review charts among other things and it's going to take a lot of extra time - more for me as I have to wade through brain fudge to get anything done. I understand it's important and serious, but I already have so much to do (and we're not allowed overtime) and she uprooted everyone's work to do this. When this person is miserable, it gets spread around.

My brain is in a flat spin and keeps going blank, I'm getting dozens of little anxiety attacks, my memory's really getting even more worse and I've had headache after headache and (thank you seasonal allergies) sinusitis just joined the party. My head feels like it's going to split open. I've used nose spray, nasal washouts, hot packs etc.

I was almost in tears on Friday. I'm screwing up so many things at work so I feel useless and dumb on a daily basis. I feel feel like cracking up but I'm trying to hide it as much as possible (my colleagues all think I'm a loon) and I just don't want any additional attention on me.

Last night I had a horrendous nightmare and then fell asleep on the couch this morning and - yes - the nightmare continued where it had left off. Aaargh! God, I'm so effing fed up with all of this right now. PTSD is ruining every damn aspect of my life. It's crept into every corner and some days I've just had enough! I'm holding onto my job by my fingertips. Hell, I'm holding onto sanity by my fingertips most days. Thoroughly fed up.

 

[greycloud24]

Wow! This is a bit unsettling to me. I have complained to my counselors about memory problems and they are telling me that it is due to traumatic brain injury. I thought it was the PTSD because I noticed it before I was in the car accident that had given me the TBI. I have a hard time staying focused on a single task and I frequently forget small tasks throughout life. I got my memory tested and was found to be slightly above average, but my old aptitude tests consistently placed me in the top 10% of people before. Now i am just slightly above average, and they think nothing of it. It bothers me, and I don't think the people working with me really grasp how much of a change of cognitive function and memory that this really is.

It feels like I am slowly and simultaneously getting ADHD and Alzheimer's at the same time.

 

[HëllaBubz]

OMFG, I so can relate to the Alzheimer's and ADHD! :O_o:
Wish I couldn't though! :p

I understand what you mean about the aptitude tests, I tested in the top 5% for my nursing, and now, just trying to remember how to spell can send my brain into a meltdown.
My mum stayed over at my place a few days ago, and as she was cooking breakfast she was asking me to make a decision about what I wanted to do that day with her, and I kid you not, it took me about 5 minutes just to process what she was saying, and then another 5 to come up with an answer.

I think it really hit her that day about how hard this PTSD thing has hit my life, and I kind of felt sorry for her, I've had 3 years to come to terms with it and deal with it, it's always the hardest when you first comprehend the extent of the crap that has been going on.

 

[gms1976]

Now i am just slightly above average, and they think nothing of it. It bothers me, and I don't think the people working with me really grasp how much of a change of cognitive function and memory that this really is.

It feels like I am slowly and simultaneously getting ADHD and Alzheimer's at the same time.

Hi Greycloud,

I understand how you feel. I had a long talk with my therapist about memory just last week (we do it a lot because I keep forgetting what she's said :p ) and she always has a lot to say. She's been studying PTSD for over 20 years and she tried to explain it to me in layman's terms.

The brain of a traumatized person keeps the trauma or bad experience in an active section of the memory storage system instead of processing and filing it away as we do with everything else. As a result, our brains have this trauma "idling" just below the surface all the time with it's fingers dipped into our adrenals. We're not aware of it most of the time (until we trigger) but it imposes a tremendous stress on our brains to keep in a functioning holding pattern (watching the world for threats and below the surface so the memory doesn't bother us again) and deal with everyday stress. As PTSD progresses, the brain starts to lose the ability to keep all the balls in the air so to speak and things get dropped. Literally, our brains start to experience burnout because they are so hypervigilant.

Because of all the subconscious trauma and emotional turmoil, our brains are constantly trying to escape and they are willing to try anything to prevent them from re-experiencing the trauma (that is ever so near all time in the form of unprocessed memory). As a result our brains are on a mission to deliberately distract themselves from reliving what they fear is just below the surface. This results in poor reading, difficulty concentrating, ADHD-type activity, day dreaming, dissociation, flashbacks etc. It also plays merry hell with memory because of the traumatic nature of the memory itself and where it's stored.

I hope I've sort of been able to explain it. I understand more than you could ever imagine. I go daily wondering if I'm losing my marbles a bit more. Heck, my marbles have rolled so far and wide I think we would probably have to get a search party to find them all.:laugh:

Gayle

 

[gms1976]

Bubzilla,

I love your pic. :laugh: That is exactly how I feel daily! LOL! You made me smile and that doesn't happen often these days.

Thanks!

 

[HëllaBubz]

Hehehehe, not a prob gms, I love making people smile, and considering I have cats of my own, the pic made me howl with laughter when I found it.:roflmao:

I tell you what, I've got a lethal case of the 'dumb' today, I haven't been able to sleep during the morning for 4 days, and I'm starting to go mental! Hopefully tonight and tomorrow I can get some decent rest.:sleep:

It's rather annoying when people 'brain' all around you, and you've forgotten what having one feels like!:rolleyes:

 

[gms1976]

Bubzilla,

Just had to let you know I had an almost terminal case of the "dumb" today.:confused: Really felt like screwing my head off and handing it to someone else to deal with. I'm working so slow it's just a matter of time until my boss comes down on my head (unless I've handed it off).:p

 

[Innordinate]

I only managed to read some of what you wrote. Maybe 1/3 of all the original post.

I was going to originally offer to swap brains. you could have mine. But then.. after reading just a little bit of you're first post... we have the same type brain.

It's photographic, but we can't recall the info we need to when we need to. But better believe when we DON'T need to we can recall every single detail that was ever there. Or if we get a reminder of something it's right there right now even if we never could recall it consciously on our own.

Sorry.

I would take yours in trade.. only you'd end up with the same.

 

[.Ambivalent.]

Your brain sounds a lot like mine. Heh. I also work in the healthcare field, directly under a RN (although, I'm not a nurse myself). My job requires me to be doing about a million things at once and frequently checking in with the RN. Which means, trying to remember what I need to report to her, as well as everything else I need to do, including direct patient care. I swear, I spend the majority of any shift, whether it be eight hours or sixteen, trying to remember what I'm supposed to be doing and the order in which it needs to be done.

In general, it seems like the important stuff in my long-term memory is fine. The less important stuff (like math!) is gone, and short-term memory is like non-existent :eek: . I, too, am constantly using calculators and counting on my fingers for simple equations. As part of my job, I pass meds, which requires checking and double checking that I've given the patient the correct number of pills. I often lose count and start over. I swear, there are days when I have to count the same pills ten times just to make sure, because I can't remember what I counted last! Still, somehow I do it and I haven't messed up a pill count in over a year!

I forget things in the middle of conversations, too. I'm usually asking people to repeat the same thing several times, because I honestly don't remember what they said. Actually, this happened at work today in the middle of discussing a patient with the RN. It was like, what she was saying registered, but the moment she finished saying it, it was like it never happened. Thankfully, she's very nice and patient with me and hasn't yet said anything about me asking her to repeat over and over.

Do you ever take random notes, to try to remember things? I do this constantly. My desks (at home and work) are usually covered in post-it's so I remember what I need to do or whatever. My problem is I either forget to look at them, or at work, someone throws them away!

On a related note, I just spelled 'away' wrong three times before I remembered how to spell it. I think I made my point!

 

[HëllaBubz]

Well, I just found out that the reason my mum is so understanding of my PTSD is because she has/had it herself!

Apparently her trigger was being in a relationship where intimacy was a constant, and so she melted down like I did, and so my childhood memories of her being volatile and emotional as well as completely withdrawn and always exhausted make a lot of sense now.

Combine that with the fact that she got post natal after having my brother, who is now 19, and my respect for my mother has grown even more, and taught me a lot more about myself as well.

Mum said she hasn't told dad about it, but to be honest, dad has got so many issues of his own that very few emotions exist outside of his world, so it probably wouldn't make a difference anyway.....besides, he learnt to sling mud from my grandmother, so divulging things to dad has never really been something I was happy to do, especially after all the mud he would sling at either myself or mum during an argument.

My mum, although she still has her problems, is an inspiration to me, because I know I can get through it, and if she could have 3 children, home school them, run a farm and then go re-educate herself again in a different field, the sky is my limit.

I just feel so sad that my mother doesn't/didn't have the fantastic support and understanding that I have with my partner, it makes me so sad I'm tearing up now, but as I said to her, visit me in the present, not in the past, because I don't live in the past.

I only hope I can be as awesome as my mum.