Another training post; this lesson is called writing prompt.  I thought it was quite silly; they gave me a single word, cavity, to go with.  OK, what do I do with this; I hate the dentist so finding something positive there will be a stretch.  Well, in essence, cavities are holes, right?  What kind of holes could possibly be related to a traumatic brain injury?  Lots of holes, actually, were created by my tbi but the real story is how those holes were filled.  What do you say, let’s go spelunking, OK?

The first cavity that came to mind was where I was heading when I met the tbi monster, work.  I never made it there that morning and it doesn’t look like I ever will.  I had spent years learning the job, getting an education and chasing certifications to position myself for whatever career moves made themselves available, then, BAM, no more career.  I guess that is how athletes feel when an injury brings theirs to an early end.  I could have given up and played the victim, I know some who have.  That’s not how I was raised and it is not how have ever approached any adversity or challenge.

My situation was a little different because of the nature of the injury.  I had serious problems with what is referred to in the brain injury world as initiation or adynamia (Click here for more information on adynamia).   Most people think of it as motivation which was never an issue in anything else I ever did but after the tbi, I lacked any kind of motivation.

Since I wasn’t able to find any internal “initiation”, Bonnie had to come up with some type of external motivation and that included digging into my past for some memories of what might give me motivation to pull myself out of the mire of this tbi fog.  She reminded me of how I learned to analyze and overcome problems by watching my Grandfather when I was a child and how he would never let anything stop him.  You can read about this in detail in my post Turning Point.

Traumatic brain injuries can cause many different kinds of cavities but with a little help, they can be filled.