I didn’t know Brain Fog was a real thing.
I didn’t understand that there is a difference between feeling tired, forgetting someone’s name or not wanting to go out on a weeknight and feeling completely exhausted all the time, forgetting every day words and phrases, or feeling as though socializing in general is too much to handle.
After losing my dad, and with the way in which we lost him, (tragically and suddenly without much warning at all) I think my family started experiencing different levels of PTSD. I can’t speak for my mom or my siblings so I will only explain my experiences with this, but I have had conversations with them and they’ve dealt with some form of symptoms in this area on their own.
Trauma is a very personal experience. There are life events that to one person, are Earth shattering, while to another, aren’t that intense. There are global events that can be traumatic to hundreds, and thousands of people, and there are small, yet life-changing moments that will stick with a person forever. I think losing your dad (or anyone you love) is up there with the major life moments.
I look back on that day and still have a hard time processing everything. I haven’t talked much about the specific details of what happened on December 10, 2020 because it honestly went in and out of my memory for a long time. My brain was trying to cope and by shutting down those memories, that was my way of not feeling the intense pain that came with them. I now have the clarity to remember what happened and the emotions that came with it. I think that’s important to have when handling grief head-on. I think taking back control of what is causing you pain and knowing that you are bigger than those moments provides you with the strength and confidence of knowing that life goes on and so will you.
I didn’t start realizing I was struggling physically until a few weeks after my dad passed. I would walk into rooms and it was as if I had just “come to”, I would have no memory of why I was there or what I needed to do. I would be speaking and then not be able to find words. Very normal, every day words that I (and most people) use all the time. I wasn’t too concerned at first because this happens to everyone, but not at the rate I was experiencing it. It was almost every day. I was finding myself very confused, flustered, and frustrated because it was hard for me to have normal conversations with people. I would get stuck on a word and almost go into a trance with my eyes closed and my mouth open trying to sound it out because I knew of the word, my brain just couldn’t put it on my tongue. There was an instance when my mom and I were talking and we both couldn’t think of the same word. It was “Cast Iron Skillet” but all we could come up with in the 3 minutes of us just sitting and blankly staring at each other were “Craftsman Pan” and “Steel Wool”. That was it. There were no other words coming to our minds and it was excruciating. I began to feel tears streaming down my face because I was so angry at my brain for being so useless. It was almost painful to think that hard. There have been times when I am in a conversation and someone references a discussion from earlier on in that same conversation and I have no recollection of it. That has started some arguments between J and me because I get extremely stubborn when I believe I am right, so to have no memory of a conversation that happened not 3 minutes earlier is way too hard to process.
I’ve experienced other symptoms of PTSD that I’m just now being to understand. I keep myself fairly active. I do at least 10,000 steps per day with multiple workouts mixed in. I cook a lot, I clean and I run a lot of errands. I am constantly on the go and try to keep myself as busy as I can. When it’s time for bed, no matter how active I was or how many miles I walked, I will not be able to fall asleep. I could stay up all night long and it would be easy. I was taking pills and vitamins to help me for a few weeks but overall I don’t enjoy how I feel the next day after I take those. I now have a little anxiety device (I talked about it in my Favorite Things post) that helps me gradually get tired and sleep through the night.
I used to be a very detail oriented and motivated person. I now have to write down lists every day of what I need to get done. If I don’t have those lists or my tasks right in front of me, I get distracted, I easily can talk myself out of doing something and most of the time, I will end up in bed because the thought of getting things done is too overwhelming.
While I’m reading back what I’ve written, it’s hard to properly convey how intense all these new realities feel in my everyday life. I think it’s important to understand that when I have these moments, when I can’t find the right word, I can’t remember what was said to me earlier in the day, or I’m lying in bed fully awake at 2am, all I think about is my dad. I think about how much I miss him, how weirdly lonely life is without him here even though we are constantly surrounded by people we love. I think about how my life changed in a literal second. I went from laughing with my mom and brother to jumping on top of my mom while she was hysterically screaming and crying because I needed to hug her and tell her everything was going to be ok. I think about finding my brother collapsed on the floor because he just had to tell the doctors to let our dad go and that we wouldn’t be able to get there in time to see him before he was gone. I think about holding my sister in our childhood bedroom in the dark while we sobbed together. I think about calling my uncles and aunts and family friends and having to explain to them over and over how my dad was gone, even though he was just here yesterday. Having to console them while they wept and grieved. I think about how I looked at myself in the mirror while sitting on my dad’s side of the bed and telling myself I no longer had a dad and screaming until my blood vessels popped under my eyes and I lost all color in my face. I think about how my family has bonded together and become a stronger and more united team in this horrific time of our lives.
I think PTSD is very different for everyone and how you choose to cope and manage it is on you. I already talked about how I’ve quit drinking and that is still going strong. It makes me feel incredibly in control of myself to make that choice every day and I need that. I also needed someone to talk to and starting therapy a few weeks ago is a step that I believe will be extremely beneficial over time. I am doing what’s right for me right now. That may change in the future and that will be future Alex’s problem to deal with. Thank you for listening every time I need to vent, this, is a form of therapy that I am beyond grateful for and will cherish.
I also wanted to provide some links about Brain Fog and PTSD in case anyone wanted to do more research. I’ve been reading up a lot on the effects of trauma and grief and everything that comes with it and it’s been interesting to learn more about what I’m feeling and that I’m not crazy. Even when I can’t think of the words to say that I’m not crazy.
LINKS
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3181836/
https://mendyourmental.com/ – this is my anxiety device I use that helps me fall asleep at night*
