Last week, while scrolling through my news feed on social media, I had a rather abrupt realization: my life looks pretty normal these days. I’m not one of those disingenuous souls who carefully curates every post. In fact, I lean decidedly the other way. My lack of a verbal filter means I can occasionally be overly candid. Rarely does anyone have to ask me what I really mean.
But as I scrolled through my posts from the last few weeks, a picture emerged — a picture of someone enjoying life. There were several photos of flowers from our gardens. I’ve found great joy in the simple tasks that come with tending to my flower beds. Weeding, pruning, and regular fertilizing result in abundant blooms I’m not shy about showing off.
This has been a year of outdoor hardscape projects, projects I’m equally boastful of. Ask me about the new Trex deck I recently built, and you’ll certainly get an earful. How about that fresh mulch I spread just last weekend? Nothing beats the smell of fresh mulch.
Right up there on my passion list is backyard birdwatching. Over the last few weeks, virtually every birdhouse has become home to a brood of new fledglings. Now that it’s summer here in New Hampshire, our hummingbirds dart around the yard with stunning agility. It’s just wonderful. Our backyard bird-cam provides the occasional post featuring cardinals, catbirds, or brilliant goldfinches.
So, what does all this have to do with brain injury? More than you might think. While these days my presence on social media leans decidedly toward a pastoral, peaceful life, that wasn’t always the case. For many years, much of my online presence was defined by repeated posts about the struggles I face as a brain injury survivor. Life was exceedingly difficult, and I was not shy about shouting it from the mountaintops.
You might be asking yourself what changed. That’s the same question I asked myself. It’s a simple question with a complicated answer. I’m still living with the same brain injury and still face many of the same challenges. Neurofatigue can still paralyze me. Slow processing sometimes feels like a way of life. Beyond the definable challenges, I often wrestle with low self-worth, wrongly telling myself that those who are uninjured somehow have more value than I do.
Yet, with these challenges, the big takeaway is this: brain injury no longer defines my life.
I attribute most of this shift to the passage of time. Now halfway through my second decade as a survivor, I know that I have survived — and more importantly, I’m familiar with the brain injury life. With that familiarity comes acceptance. I got tired of fighting something I have no control over. I surrendered to my post-injury life. And in that surrender, the battle ended. I surrendered, yet I won in the long run.
While I have no control over the fact that I have a brain injury, there are many things that are within my control. I have choices. These days, I’m making more choices to do things that are good for me. Spending time in my garden is a good choice for my well-being. Tending to my flowers is another good one. When I’m overtired, finding a quiet spot in the yard to watch our bird feeders is better than any therapy. I’ll call that Nature’s Therapy.
These days, I live a life that I love. It’s far from perfect. There are still times when it… well, sucks. But the good times, the times where life is actually better than okay, define most of my life today.
Many years ago, I lived with suicidal ideation, unable to envision a life worth living. I couldn’t match my own socks, couldn’t tell you the day of the week, and couldn’t get through a full sentence without word-finding issues. Today, I can identify most of my backyard birds by their songs alone. I allowed time to pass and actively sought out the things that brought me joy. Today, I am blessed beyond measure — and grateful beyond words — that those early years were not my endgame.