I'm Driving to the Mental Hospital

March is Brain Injury Awareness Month. 

I found the following conversation from six years ago that may represent what many caretakers of brain injury patients go through or have been through. Maybe it will give you some insight into the aftermath of brain injuries. I also found this picture of Isaiah from that time six years ago.

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We were in the car when I told Isaiah he had lint in his hair. He never remembered to brush his hair, so it was a common issue. It made him mad. He told me I didn’t need to say that to him.

What?!

I explained that it wasn’t a criticism and I figured he’d want to know if he had something in his hair. That annoyed him even more! I told him that when I tell his Dad that HE has something on his face or something like that, he tells me THANK YOU. So, that’s probably what he should say too. He then explained that it’s okay for me to tell him that something is on his face, but not that there is lint in his hair.

“What would you rather me say, Isaiah?”

“I want you to say, ‘you have something in your hair, Isaiah’.”

“That’s the same thing son. That’s silly,” I said.

“Well, that’s what I want you to say.”

Do you feel a little crazy as you read this because at that point I started feeling that way? I asked him if it was okay for me to tell him that he has a piece of fuzz in his hair. He told me YES! I can tell him that there is fuzz in his hair. 

“There’s no difference!! Isaiah, I am just going to drive to the mental hospital right now, because you are making me crazy.”

It is also possible that I screamed, and said it in a maniacal tone. I’m not really sure, because, at that point, I was losing my mind.

He laughed, but he didn’t care. He was serious about his demands. I realized it must have been a brain injury thing, but it’s really difficult to handle some days. Lord help me. 

I had to let go, for my own sanity, and to get through the rest of the day.

That night, before he went to sleep, he told me his head felt funny. He said it felt like a “heartbeat” inside. He was worried and afraid he would have another brain bleed. He confessed that he thought about it all the time. He believed that fear is why he had trouble sleeping sometimes.

“I don’t want to go back to the hospital. I don’t want to not talk again. I don’t want any of that.”

Tears came to my eyes. I asked, “Do you think about it every day?”

“All the time. Every single day,” he answered.

I hated that for him. He told me that he always thinks about how life would be different if it hadn’t happened. He said that he would still be playing football. But then, he said that it’s okay it happened and that life is better in some ways. He knows that God is doing things in his life.

Although he’s okay with it now, he doesn’t want to go through the pain and struggle as he did in the beginning. As tough as some days are, and as much as he feared the actual bleed occurring again, he wouldn’t change what’s happened. 

What if each of us could always see how God is using our struggles, and pay attention to what we could learn through them?

As much as Isaiah frustrated me, he amazed me just as much. He has taught me more than I ever thought a child could. That’s how God works. We just have to pay attention.

Before he went to sleep, Isaiah said, “I really love you, Mom.”

Sometimes it’s so difficult and frustrating for both of us, and I just need to hear those words. Thank you, Lord.

I Peter 5:10 “And after you have suffered a little while, the God of all grace, who has called you to his eternal glory in Christ, will himself restore, confirm, strengthen, and establish you.”