More therapy—occupational, physical, an evaluation for speech therapy, vision evaluations, etc.—but also every day I feel more "recovered" and back, or hopefully forward, to my old/new self.
Still tough typing, but better. Noticed this morning I wrote "are" for "our" and "to" for "so" etc. That's obviously a cognitive thing not "motor skills" (wrote that first as "stills") since the letters are far apart on the keyboard so obviously my brain is interpreting my directions as something other than I think I'm intending.
But there's motor stuff too as I often hit a letter on a close by key ("f" for "d" etc.), plus my usual two-fingered speed typing mistakes of just transposing letters (typing "throguh" instead of "through") only many more than usual.
But the reading is almost "normal" except for getting tired either mentally or just my eyes. And my capacity to take in more and more without feeling anxious or like the input is too overwhelming.
Unfortunately along with that complexity comes a loss of the simple clarity of those first weeks when everything seemed singularly special and precisely what it was (though the accumulation of these sensations like I said became overwhelming if I didn't confine my experiences to "one thing at a time"—including people etc.
One of the things that strikes me most about being at this point in the recovery of my mental and physical faculties is how peaceful I continue to feel about it all. I used to have something to read—usually a NEW YORKER or a Sunday NY TIMES—with me wherever I went, auditions, the train, doctors' offices, the gym, etc. I'd read on the treadmill, waiting for be seen by a casting director, etc.
I don't do that now. I couldn't for (I first wrote "more"!) most of the past month, and have no interest in doing it still. So when I find myself waiting in the doc's office or for the occupational therapist or whatever, and time is passing, I just close my eyes and let the time pass as it will, and does. Very peaceful and accepting feeling and I am enormously grateful for it, because as anyone who has known me before knows, I was always naturally speedy and had to work very hard (or do other things very intensely) to slow down at all. Now it seems to come "naturally"—and I don't want to jinx it but even the trouble I normally have falling back to sleep when things wake me up during the night seems to have been relieved, ever since I finished the steroids used for the first week after the brain surgery to keep the swelling in the brain down. Could it be whatever was in my brain was causing the trouble sleeping? I'm hoping, but mostly I'm just accepting the recent reality of not needing to make endless lists to fall asleep or back asleep.
But don't worry, I'm sure my compulsion to make lists will return and manifest itself in some other way soon enough. Meanwhile these posts are their own lists in a way. Including lists of some of the many things I am grateful for.
Monday, December 14, 2009
Sunday, December 13, 2009
UP IN THE AIR
Watched another movie I got in the mail for the awards season—UP IN THE AIR. I dug it, though I kept missing a line of dialogue now and then and wasn't sure if that was my brain still having trouble (today's the month marker if you go strictly by the date) or if the movie just requires a second viewing to pick up on everything.
It was another relatively "easy" movie for me to follow, with only a few main characters and mostly confined settings and an at-first seemingly simple and direct plot line. George Clooney carries the film and as always is a delight to watch in action—or inaction.
He is definitely our one true old fashioned Hollywood movie star, the Paul Newman of his generation. And though the movie is close to all surface (I kept thinking of paintings by Alex Katz, no shadows, flat seemingly two-dimensional figures that on a closer look somehow project a greater depth than the surface tension that supports the abstract sense of the way the figures figure in the breadth of the canvas initially seems to support—or something like that—my brain's tired, it's late, but my fingers are connecting to my thoughts and the keys on the computer much better these past few days with fewer corrections being necessary, though till much more than pre-brain surgery) it evokes deeper meanings with every frame.
The films seems to create a paradox that it never resolves, which is how the goal of simplifying one's life can actually lead to creating a more self-centered, selfish existence—or vice versa.
Clooney's main co-stars—Vera Famiga (doesn't that sound like one of those 1940s Hollywood stars who were refugees from the war in Europe or pretending to be—most of whom were never heard from again?) and Anna Kendrick are a great match for him, Famiga not a favorite of mine but nailing this role and Kendrick a revelation. But it's Clooney's show and he doesn't disappoint.
Neither does the flick. Deceptively complex despite, as I said, it's seemingly only skin deep surface tension(s). I'd see if I were you.
[P.S. UP IN THE AIR is a pretty good description of what's it's felt like to go through this recovery from brain surgery, like each day's decisions seem to leave me mostly there.]
It was another relatively "easy" movie for me to follow, with only a few main characters and mostly confined settings and an at-first seemingly simple and direct plot line. George Clooney carries the film and as always is a delight to watch in action—or inaction.
He is definitely our one true old fashioned Hollywood movie star, the Paul Newman of his generation. And though the movie is close to all surface (I kept thinking of paintings by Alex Katz, no shadows, flat seemingly two-dimensional figures that on a closer look somehow project a greater depth than the surface tension that supports the abstract sense of the way the figures figure in the breadth of the canvas initially seems to support—or something like that—my brain's tired, it's late, but my fingers are connecting to my thoughts and the keys on the computer much better these past few days with fewer corrections being necessary, though till much more than pre-brain surgery) it evokes deeper meanings with every frame.
The films seems to create a paradox that it never resolves, which is how the goal of simplifying one's life can actually lead to creating a more self-centered, selfish existence—or vice versa.
Clooney's main co-stars—Vera Famiga (doesn't that sound like one of those 1940s Hollywood stars who were refugees from the war in Europe or pretending to be—most of whom were never heard from again?) and Anna Kendrick are a great match for him, Famiga not a favorite of mine but nailing this role and Kendrick a revelation. But it's Clooney's show and he doesn't disappoint.
Neither does the flick. Deceptively complex despite, as I said, it's seemingly only skin deep surface tension(s). I'd see if I were you.
[P.S. UP IN THE AIR is a pretty good description of what's it's felt like to go through this recovery from brain surgery, like each day's decisions seem to leave me mostly there.]
Saturday, December 12, 2009
IT'S COMPLICATED
The connection between the ways in which our individual brains are wired and our ideas—and taste and beliefs—is becoming more apparent each day, from studies and neurological research and scientific breakthroughs in the world, as well as for me personally as a result of what I've been experiencing and learning in the four weeks (and one day in a few hours) since my brain surgery.
I've referred to this either directly or indirectly in recent posts (as have some comments on them, including links to one study addressing the differences between the brains of "conservatives" and "liberals").
One of the examples I gave for myself was how because of the limitations on my brain during these recent weeks, my taste in TV and movies had changed some. A week ago I was unable to enjoy THE DAILY SHOW because there were too many layers of irony and wordplay etc. It actually began to hurt my brain after only a few minutes. Too much complexity.
But I was able to enjoy 30 ROCK, despite its own layers of irony and wordplay etc. because the basic premises of the comedy were so broad and applied in an over the top style that made it possible for me to laugh out loud at the basic joke inherent in each scene even if I was missing the more subtle stuff (which I couldn't tell was even there, if it was). (Not that Jon Stewart isn't often very broad in his comedy or over-the-top, but the shifts in topics and approaches to the nuances of political hypocrisy etc. are way more complex to my mind.)
So, it was as if my taste had changed. A similar thing has happened with movies. For a while I couldn't watch them or if I did I couldn't get a lot of what was happening in most movies. But black-and-white old Hollywood ones, with simple and mostly confined sets and only a few main characters, were not only easier to get but so much more satisfying.
What I am able to understand and follow has been broadening every day since the surgery, but it is still limited compared to how I was before it, so it is impossible for me to tell how much of what I'm digging now is a result of my old standards coming back or of the limitations on how far they've come.
For instance, I got a movie in the mail recently for the Hollywood awards season and watched it last night and totally enjoyed it to the point of bursting out in spontaneous applause in response to certain scenes or even just individual actors' gestures or facial expressions. I laughed out loud a lot, and even fell for the leading lady, an actress I have often not liked in movies others loved, and never found attractive though I did dig some of the roles she's played.
The film is IT'S COMPLICATED and the actress is Meryl Streep. Her main co-star is Alec Baldwin, who for my taste—past and present—is always terrific and does great work in this as well (making some scenes he's in worth the price of admittance, if I'd been paying to see it) (and full disclosure, he's an old friend). And Steve Martin has a co-starring role as well and does his usual terrific job (though the friend I was watching it with thought his face looked less expressive than it used to leading to speculation about "face jobs").
But for me the main revelation was Streep. I thought she was way overrated in some of her earlier dramatic films (e.g. THE DEERHUNTER and IRONWEED) but liked her in later comedies (like POSTCARDS FROM THE EDGE). But in IT'S COMPLICATED I love every scene she's in, every nuance of her interpretation of the character she plays, and everything about her physically. In many ways, the movie and the way she plays her role made made me fall in love with her. She's playing a 60-year-old woman, or is one, (I can't remember if the move makes her exact age clear) and to me she wasn't for one second not totally beautiful.
I realize that JULIE AND JULIA is the movie and the role that has endeared her to audiences recently (a film I missed but intend to see as soon as I'm able) and that IT'S COMPLICATED is pretty light fare in comparison to most of her Oscar-nominated roles, and that possibly the limitations I still feel on my brain may be influencing me, but I enjoyed IT'S COMPLICATED so much I'd probably nominate it for a bunch of awards, most particularly for her and Baldwin and Martin.
I cannot recommend this movie too highly, if you're in the mood for a lighthearted though thoroughly adult romantic comedy in the spirit of the Hollywood classics of that genre, though much more contemporary and explicit. (The only caveat I have is that Mary Kay Place has only a few lines in the movie and for my taste she has always been one of our best and most underrated actresses so I wish she had been used more.)
PS: As you can probably tell, the writing is improving every day, as is so much else. I still have to keep things pretty simple, which has always been my goal anyway so being sort of forced to do that is actually a blessing.
I've referred to this either directly or indirectly in recent posts (as have some comments on them, including links to one study addressing the differences between the brains of "conservatives" and "liberals").
One of the examples I gave for myself was how because of the limitations on my brain during these recent weeks, my taste in TV and movies had changed some. A week ago I was unable to enjoy THE DAILY SHOW because there were too many layers of irony and wordplay etc. It actually began to hurt my brain after only a few minutes. Too much complexity.
But I was able to enjoy 30 ROCK, despite its own layers of irony and wordplay etc. because the basic premises of the comedy were so broad and applied in an over the top style that made it possible for me to laugh out loud at the basic joke inherent in each scene even if I was missing the more subtle stuff (which I couldn't tell was even there, if it was). (Not that Jon Stewart isn't often very broad in his comedy or over-the-top, but the shifts in topics and approaches to the nuances of political hypocrisy etc. are way more complex to my mind.)
So, it was as if my taste had changed. A similar thing has happened with movies. For a while I couldn't watch them or if I did I couldn't get a lot of what was happening in most movies. But black-and-white old Hollywood ones, with simple and mostly confined sets and only a few main characters, were not only easier to get but so much more satisfying.
What I am able to understand and follow has been broadening every day since the surgery, but it is still limited compared to how I was before it, so it is impossible for me to tell how much of what I'm digging now is a result of my old standards coming back or of the limitations on how far they've come.
For instance, I got a movie in the mail recently for the Hollywood awards season and watched it last night and totally enjoyed it to the point of bursting out in spontaneous applause in response to certain scenes or even just individual actors' gestures or facial expressions. I laughed out loud a lot, and even fell for the leading lady, an actress I have often not liked in movies others loved, and never found attractive though I did dig some of the roles she's played.
The film is IT'S COMPLICATED and the actress is Meryl Streep. Her main co-star is Alec Baldwin, who for my taste—past and present—is always terrific and does great work in this as well (making some scenes he's in worth the price of admittance, if I'd been paying to see it) (and full disclosure, he's an old friend). And Steve Martin has a co-starring role as well and does his usual terrific job (though the friend I was watching it with thought his face looked less expressive than it used to leading to speculation about "face jobs").
But for me the main revelation was Streep. I thought she was way overrated in some of her earlier dramatic films (e.g. THE DEERHUNTER and IRONWEED) but liked her in later comedies (like POSTCARDS FROM THE EDGE). But in IT'S COMPLICATED I love every scene she's in, every nuance of her interpretation of the character she plays, and everything about her physically. In many ways, the movie and the way she plays her role made made me fall in love with her. She's playing a 60-year-old woman, or is one, (I can't remember if the move makes her exact age clear) and to me she wasn't for one second not totally beautiful.
I realize that JULIE AND JULIA is the movie and the role that has endeared her to audiences recently (a film I missed but intend to see as soon as I'm able) and that IT'S COMPLICATED is pretty light fare in comparison to most of her Oscar-nominated roles, and that possibly the limitations I still feel on my brain may be influencing me, but I enjoyed IT'S COMPLICATED so much I'd probably nominate it for a bunch of awards, most particularly for her and Baldwin and Martin.
I cannot recommend this movie too highly, if you're in the mood for a lighthearted though thoroughly adult romantic comedy in the spirit of the Hollywood classics of that genre, though much more contemporary and explicit. (The only caveat I have is that Mary Kay Place has only a few lines in the movie and for my taste she has always been one of our best and most underrated actresses so I wish she had been used more.)
PS: As you can probably tell, the writing is improving every day, as is so much else. I still have to keep things pretty simple, which has always been my goal anyway so being sort of forced to do that is actually a blessing.
Friday, December 11, 2009
FOUR WEEKS TODAY (SINCE BRAIN SURGERY)
And so much has changed in these four weeks. I couldn't read or write or do much of anything besides talk and listen and eat and drink (lots of herbal teas) in the first few days after the operation.
One of the most stunning examples of the ways in which my brain couldn't operate as usual that first week, was when I was on the phone with someone and they wanted to pass on a message to a friend who was in the hospital room with me and though I understood the simple message I was meant to convey and knew what it meant to do that, my brain somehow would not let me. I could not for the life of me just say the few words that would have passed the message on. Just one example of many that illustrate how limited what I could accomplish was those first few days (including reading and writing).
By the end of the first week I could read out loud some but not silently to myself, could only write a few sentences with several corrections necessary in every word and feeling exhausted after only that. I couldn't multiply single numbers or do other simple basic math or touch my nose without missing it or remember certain words etc. etc, And my perceptions were so diffused and atomized I couldn't take dealing with more than one thing at a time (the first few days in the hospital were an exception as I was still coming down from the operation drugs and anesthesia I guess—and still on heavy steroids etc.—so was very speedy in my speech and seemingly not bothered by all the friends and family who visited).
But after those first few days in the hospital, if more than one person tried to talk to me at a time it hurt my head and made me extremely anxious. People were dropping off food at my apartment and they would enter and start to empty bags and talk to me and I would ask them to leave because it was too much for me if there was anyone else there at the same time.
I couldn't watch almost any TV or read or listen to music—all of that seemed overwhelmingly complicated, like the words on the page or the images on the TV or the individual sounds in the music were a cacophony of dissonant and gratingly loud and aggravatingly harsh sounds. The images on TV seemed so distinctly separate that every second's alteration from one moving image to the next was a whirlwind of so much movement and imagery it felt like a universe of discord was fighting for attention in my brain's limitations.
But by the end of the second week, I was reading a little to myself (a paragraph a day was about my limit) and very well out loud. Writing was still almost impossibly difficult and full of odd mishaps like substituting entirely different words for the ones I thought I was directing my brain to write, as in "who" for "now" or "instinct" for "image" or "Thursday" for "operation"! Not to mention the numerous typos and strange reversals and additions that altered the meaning of words or sentences or ideas.
It was fascinating to experience and quite engaging, at least to me. In those first two weeks I spent a lot of time just sitting and smiling (at least to myself) over how contented and unfrustrated I felt despite the fact that there was very little I could do besides eat and have a conversation with whoever was in the apartment with me (and in those first weeks someone was with me at all times, either my daughter Caitlin, or my older son Miles and sometimes my daughter-in-law Jennifer or my good friend Sue (I just wrote that as "god friend"—one of the many interesting typos I still make).
But by the third week I was reading much better, short articles in TIME, and able to watch relatively simple (i.e. black-and-white, two or three character simple premise) movies and TV shows, could write with slightly less problems, mostly just typos, unable to get my mind and fingers to hit the right keys but not substituting entirely incorrect (in terms of my initial intentions) words, and could abide two people in my apartment talking at the same time.
But now, in just the past two days, the writing has improved drastically, I'm typing this with mostly ordinary typos every few words rather than several in one word and tons in each sentence like it was only a few days ago! And yesterday I read an entire article in THE NEW YORKER. When just a week ago I couldn't read more than a paragraph without feeling like I just overloaded my mind for the day. So much has come back, in fact, that most of the time I feel pretty much like my old self.
There are still many things that can improve. A short outing to the store exhausts me, and being confronted with more than one or two people out in public is so painful I have to turn my eyes away or close them. And sounds, when I'm out, still do that diffuse overall cacophony thing that is hard to bear (I noticed last week when I tried being in a room with lots of people every sound to me was equally loud and overwhelming, so someone talking, someone whispering in a far corner, someone unwrapping a package or blowing their nose or walking across the room or sighing [I wrote "signing" for "sighing" at first and then trying to correct it wrote several other incorrect words including "winging"! so my incorrect word substitutions are still happening especially the more I type and my brain begins to tire] or making any sound whatsoever all come across as equally loud as though they were right up against my ear. Way too difficult to deal with).
But I am so grateful for the incredible progress I've made that any improvement or lack of it seems completely okay with me. Again I thank everyone for their love and support and hope that I didn't sound too self-righteous in my post yesterday, as if I'm always perfectly grateful for everything—"good" and "bad"—I'm not that evolved. But I'm working on it.
One of the most stunning examples of the ways in which my brain couldn't operate as usual that first week, was when I was on the phone with someone and they wanted to pass on a message to a friend who was in the hospital room with me and though I understood the simple message I was meant to convey and knew what it meant to do that, my brain somehow would not let me. I could not for the life of me just say the few words that would have passed the message on. Just one example of many that illustrate how limited what I could accomplish was those first few days (including reading and writing).
By the end of the first week I could read out loud some but not silently to myself, could only write a few sentences with several corrections necessary in every word and feeling exhausted after only that. I couldn't multiply single numbers or do other simple basic math or touch my nose without missing it or remember certain words etc. etc, And my perceptions were so diffused and atomized I couldn't take dealing with more than one thing at a time (the first few days in the hospital were an exception as I was still coming down from the operation drugs and anesthesia I guess—and still on heavy steroids etc.—so was very speedy in my speech and seemingly not bothered by all the friends and family who visited).
But after those first few days in the hospital, if more than one person tried to talk to me at a time it hurt my head and made me extremely anxious. People were dropping off food at my apartment and they would enter and start to empty bags and talk to me and I would ask them to leave because it was too much for me if there was anyone else there at the same time.
I couldn't watch almost any TV or read or listen to music—all of that seemed overwhelmingly complicated, like the words on the page or the images on the TV or the individual sounds in the music were a cacophony of dissonant and gratingly loud and aggravatingly harsh sounds. The images on TV seemed so distinctly separate that every second's alteration from one moving image to the next was a whirlwind of so much movement and imagery it felt like a universe of discord was fighting for attention in my brain's limitations.
But by the end of the second week, I was reading a little to myself (a paragraph a day was about my limit) and very well out loud. Writing was still almost impossibly difficult and full of odd mishaps like substituting entirely different words for the ones I thought I was directing my brain to write, as in "who" for "now" or "instinct" for "image" or "Thursday" for "operation"! Not to mention the numerous typos and strange reversals and additions that altered the meaning of words or sentences or ideas.
It was fascinating to experience and quite engaging, at least to me. In those first two weeks I spent a lot of time just sitting and smiling (at least to myself) over how contented and unfrustrated I felt despite the fact that there was very little I could do besides eat and have a conversation with whoever was in the apartment with me (and in those first weeks someone was with me at all times, either my daughter Caitlin, or my older son Miles and sometimes my daughter-in-law Jennifer or my good friend Sue (I just wrote that as "god friend"—one of the many interesting typos I still make).
But by the third week I was reading much better, short articles in TIME, and able to watch relatively simple (i.e. black-and-white, two or three character simple premise) movies and TV shows, could write with slightly less problems, mostly just typos, unable to get my mind and fingers to hit the right keys but not substituting entirely incorrect (in terms of my initial intentions) words, and could abide two people in my apartment talking at the same time.
But now, in just the past two days, the writing has improved drastically, I'm typing this with mostly ordinary typos every few words rather than several in one word and tons in each sentence like it was only a few days ago! And yesterday I read an entire article in THE NEW YORKER. When just a week ago I couldn't read more than a paragraph without feeling like I just overloaded my mind for the day. So much has come back, in fact, that most of the time I feel pretty much like my old self.
There are still many things that can improve. A short outing to the store exhausts me, and being confronted with more than one or two people out in public is so painful I have to turn my eyes away or close them. And sounds, when I'm out, still do that diffuse overall cacophony thing that is hard to bear (I noticed last week when I tried being in a room with lots of people every sound to me was equally loud and overwhelming, so someone talking, someone whispering in a far corner, someone unwrapping a package or blowing their nose or walking across the room or sighing [I wrote "signing" for "sighing" at first and then trying to correct it wrote several other incorrect words including "winging"! so my incorrect word substitutions are still happening especially the more I type and my brain begins to tire] or making any sound whatsoever all come across as equally loud as though they were right up against my ear. Way too difficult to deal with).
But I am so grateful for the incredible progress I've made that any improvement or lack of it seems completely okay with me. Again I thank everyone for their love and support and hope that I didn't sound too self-righteous in my post yesterday, as if I'm always perfectly grateful for everything—"good" and "bad"—I'm not that evolved. But I'm working on it.
Thursday, December 10, 2009
EVERY DAY'S A GIFT
My old friend Hubert Selby Jr. gave me some great advice one time when I was stressing out over debt and no work and raising two teenagers on my own and no relief in sight. He told me that if I got a check in the mail for a hundred bucks to get down on my knees and thank God for the blessing. But also, if I got a bill in the mail for a hundred dollars to get down on my knees and thank God for the blessing.
I got angry and told him I didn't see how a bill was a blessing when I was broke, in debt, and worried my landlord would kick me and my kids out, or that I wouldn't be able to pay the electric bill etc. etc. But I loved the guy and trusted his experience with similar troubles. So I tried it. Angrily, sarcastically, and begrudgingly.
To my surprise, it worked. Eventually. The more I did it, the better it worked (though I didn't always do it on my knees, and I'm not even certain that was part of his advice now).
There's no quid pro quo in spiritual practice, and from my experience and beliefs there shouldn't be, but—interestingly, the more I did that, the more my troubles didn't seem so insurmountable and as a result the less stressed I was and the more solutions to my troubles not only seemed possible but probable.
I've been doing that for decades now, and this past almost month (a month since the brain surgery tomorrow) I've been doing it every day and meaning it. Totally grateful for exactly what I was experiencing and being given by life for that day, and it has paid off wonderfully. Not because every day I have been getting better and more and more of my motor skills and cognitive abilities have been returning to me, but because I have been totally accepting of the limitations the operation has imposed on me and genuinely grateful for them and for the whole crazy trip.
I pray that I can stay that way no matter what the future brings—grateful for it all, especially for my old friend "Cubby"!
I got angry and told him I didn't see how a bill was a blessing when I was broke, in debt, and worried my landlord would kick me and my kids out, or that I wouldn't be able to pay the electric bill etc. etc. But I loved the guy and trusted his experience with similar troubles. So I tried it. Angrily, sarcastically, and begrudgingly.
To my surprise, it worked. Eventually. The more I did it, the better it worked (though I didn't always do it on my knees, and I'm not even certain that was part of his advice now).
There's no quid pro quo in spiritual practice, and from my experience and beliefs there shouldn't be, but—interestingly, the more I did that, the more my troubles didn't seem so insurmountable and as a result the less stressed I was and the more solutions to my troubles not only seemed possible but probable.
I've been doing that for decades now, and this past almost month (a month since the brain surgery tomorrow) I've been doing it every day and meaning it. Totally grateful for exactly what I was experiencing and being given by life for that day, and it has paid off wonderfully. Not because every day I have been getting better and more and more of my motor skills and cognitive abilities have been returning to me, but because I have been totally accepting of the limitations the operation has imposed on me and genuinely grateful for them and for the whole crazy trip.
I pray that I can stay that way no matter what the future brings—grateful for it all, especially for my old friend "Cubby"!
Wednesday, December 9, 2009
AND MORE
The progress has been so impressive the past couple of days, I'm able to type this sentence with only a few typos to correct so far, close to what is "normal" for my decades of two finger hunt-and-peck technique.
Though the accuracy diminishes the more words I write (so that there were only a few typos I had to correct in that first sentence, but I've already had to correct several more in just the first phrase of this one!).
Another telling thing about the brain (at least mine). That initially it seems to function better and better each day since the surgery, but begins to deteriorate (took me fix attempts to finally get that last word right) almost immediately and more so as I and the day go on. So that by evening, when I'm pretty tired, even if I've taken a nap, I'm back several days in my progress. But still further ahead than I was when this all began.
Today's my first day of "occupational therapy" at an institute in a nearby town that I believe is where Woody Guthrie ended his days (and where the young and not-yet-recorded Bob Dylan visited him), as well as Dudley Moore (!).
Many moments of "normalcy" these past few days, the most difficult thing for me now is going out and encountering people more than one at a time. I feel overwhelmed and have to focus on just one. It tires me out as well. But for those worried I'm overdoing it, I'll learn if I am today at the therapy, but also I can feel when it's too much or tiring me and I remove myself from the situation.
[I'm referring to the few times I've gone out to Whole Foods or the pharmacy etc., and always with a friend or family member who's doing the driving and looking out for me.]
Anyway, grateful my progress has been pretty consistent and hope for the same for others going through anything similar.
Though the accuracy diminishes the more words I write (so that there were only a few typos I had to correct in that first sentence, but I've already had to correct several more in just the first phrase of this one!).
Another telling thing about the brain (at least mine). That initially it seems to function better and better each day since the surgery, but begins to deteriorate (took me fix attempts to finally get that last word right) almost immediately and more so as I and the day go on. So that by evening, when I'm pretty tired, even if I've taken a nap, I'm back several days in my progress. But still further ahead than I was when this all began.
Today's my first day of "occupational therapy" at an institute in a nearby town that I believe is where Woody Guthrie ended his days (and where the young and not-yet-recorded Bob Dylan visited him), as well as Dudley Moore (!).
Many moments of "normalcy" these past few days, the most difficult thing for me now is going out and encountering people more than one at a time. I feel overwhelmed and have to focus on just one. It tires me out as well. But for those worried I'm overdoing it, I'll learn if I am today at the therapy, but also I can feel when it's too much or tiring me and I remove myself from the situation.
[I'm referring to the few times I've gone out to Whole Foods or the pharmacy etc., and always with a friend or family member who's doing the driving and looking out for me.]
Anyway, grateful my progress has been pretty consistent and hope for the same for others going through anything similar.
Tuesday, December 8, 2009
STILL PROGRESSING
Every day brings more progress. I feel so fortunate, especially when I hear of or from people who have had brain surgery and aren't progressing as rapidly as I am or are facing bigger challenges than anything I have or will have to.
As a simple example of the kinds of progress I've experienced: in the first week after the brain surgery, whenever I tried to put toothpaste on a toothbrush, no matter how hard I concentrated, the paste ended up perpendicular to the brush, another words across the brush, most of it falling off.
In the second week I gradually managed to get the paste to start turning a little each day so that it was heading more in the direction of where the toothpaste usually ends up. Until the last few days when it was been pretty much following the pat of the brush except slightly to one side, so that the paste isn't quite all the way on the brush but more half on half off.
For some folks, this might not be a big deal and may happen more often than not. But this was happening to me while I was concentrating very hard to get the paste on in the right direction and entirely on the toothbrush. So last night when I finally got it mostly on the brush it felt like a real triumph, because it was.
PS: the reading is so much better it's almost "normal"—though I get tired pretty quickly from it. And the writing is much better too, though also tiring, even a relatively short blog post. But in terms of the motor skills involved, much much better.
And PPS: I was able to watch a rerun of John Stewart earlier tonight and follow it without having to turn it off or feel like the layers of ironies and subtleties were hurting my brain to follow.
As a simple example of the kinds of progress I've experienced: in the first week after the brain surgery, whenever I tried to put toothpaste on a toothbrush, no matter how hard I concentrated, the paste ended up perpendicular to the brush, another words across the brush, most of it falling off.
In the second week I gradually managed to get the paste to start turning a little each day so that it was heading more in the direction of where the toothpaste usually ends up. Until the last few days when it was been pretty much following the pat of the brush except slightly to one side, so that the paste isn't quite all the way on the brush but more half on half off.
For some folks, this might not be a big deal and may happen more often than not. But this was happening to me while I was concentrating very hard to get the paste on in the right direction and entirely on the toothbrush. So last night when I finally got it mostly on the brush it felt like a real triumph, because it was.
PS: the reading is so much better it's almost "normal"—though I get tired pretty quickly from it. And the writing is much better too, though also tiring, even a relatively short blog post. But in terms of the motor skills involved, much much better.
And PPS: I was able to watch a rerun of John Stewart earlier tonight and follow it without having to turn it off or feel like the layers of ironies and subtleties were hurting my brain to follow.
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