PA students interview and trying on earrings for wedding

November 17, 2023:

Alright I’m not gonna begin this one as exciting as yesterday. I did better with photos tho! First of all, I went to an event where St. Kate’s physician assistant students were interviewing TBI survivors. It was much better than I was expecting. I was interviewed by 3 students right away, Hannah, Halimo and Priscilla. I didn’t take a lotta notes during the interview, but basically I told them my ENTIRE story, including the cancer → TBI situation.

Ok, lemme jump back to the morning. I took my meds at 7:30am, and also ran to Oxendales to get bread after id already made the food. I also thought something that I’d thought yesterday during the ECD talk, that managing my medications well gives me a sense of control. THAT’S why I love the calendars I use, and for December I'm going to get more space so I can also write what I take the meds with on that calendar too.

Anyways, then I drove to St. Catherine’s for my 9:30am meeting with some PA students interviewing TBI survivors. I’ve got the photo with Hannah/Linda/Pricilla after I told them all about my blog and how it started as a pure coping skill, but now has grown into something much bigger. I handed them each one of my photography business cards, which made me convinced I HAVE to get business cards for my blog site too. So in terms of the conversations we had, I basically just told them literally my entire story, including some of my unhealthy coping mechanisms I hope I’ve moved beyond now. I also mentioned that one effect of the brain injury might actually be an increased acceptance of all my cancer trauma, which I was avoiding by working CONSTANTLY. I still love working, and I do it unpaid now, but I’m no longer gonna try to drown everything in work.

I showed them my TBI recovery blog site. I was able to get to it by reading the URL, which is a thing that made me wanna shorten the URL and get business cards. Another thought I had while I talked to them today was that in a way, I’ve literally become better organized post-TBI. They also did a small physical exam, and said something about how they didn’t think my left leg was dramatically weaker than my right. I mentioned the gym too, and also said that trying to become bilingual is a HUGE focus for me post-TBI. In fact, when I got an email from Accord about jobs today, I decided to email that I’d really only be interested in pursuing work that uses some Spanish. I’m NOT gonna get everything in here that was said, lemme just skim through to see what else... I said that 2022 was the year of actual hell for me, that I thought that happiness is more a side effect than a goal to be in search of, I said that the TBI helped me deal with my cancer trauma in a way, since it removed my coping mechanism, which was working constantly.

I also had the thought that my life before the brain injury was NOT good, but it definitely had the building blocks of a good life. Things like the skills and friends I have. I know I said that I was saying a big effect of the TBI was an intensification of things, though I don’t remember the examples I thought of. After they interviewed me, we all gathered in a room, and all the students did a presentation on each one of us. I made sure to record the presentation they did on me. I’ll listen to it later, even though I’m afraid it was a little quiet. Also interesting to hear the other stories. In a very weird way, it was kind of a good that that Mattheas cancelled on me today since he had to sleep. I had a very busy day anyways, and I got the chance to get some more stuff done since I didn’t have lunch with him today. We’re setting up another date in the future though.

Anyways, here I’m trying to be al ittle more judicious in what I include, especially since mom came over tonight and we ordered some business cards for my new TBI recovery blog. They call me a “survivor•photographer•translator.” I was sure of that idea bc I gave some PA students my blog, and it was hard to do it. What mom and I did was we created a QR code you can scan to access it! Better than a photo since this isn’t really a photography blog anyways, even though I’d like to move towards including a bit more photography.

Outta space, but mom and I also went to Dominguez and had dinner there tonight. I didn’t take my meds with dinner, but waited over two hours after I’d eaten and had them with one of the new 9g chai drinks, and also part of a piece of cheese leftover from the other day. Also took a pic with my dress for tomorrow and some earrings I asked friends about. It's 1am lol.