A few years ago I slipped while skating my feet went up over my head and I landed on the ice the back of my head connecting first. I recall seeing blackness in front of my eyes before it resolved into a somewhat spotty and spiny winters sky.
The pain is the first thing that came through with clarity and I recall rolling over, pulling my knees up and crouching on the ice my head held in my hands trying to tolerate the waves of pain crashing through my head.
It took me several minutes to be able to respond to the people asking if I was ok and even longer to get up off the ice and shakily make my way inside to remove my skates. We left shortly afterwards and although I knew I didn’t feel quite right I brushed it off hoping I would feel better in a few minutes.
Instead what happened was one of the most frightening experiences of my life. After arriving home I began to feel more and more off, something just didn’t feel right. I was nauseous, my head was pounding but most alarming of all was that I couldn’t think properly. I was becoming increasingly confused and unable to comprehend what was going on around me.
My husband of course had been watching me carefully and when he became aware that one of my eyes was no longer reacting to light and that I really wasn’t ok decided that a trip to the ER was in order. I think the fact that I didn’t object in the least probably gave him a bit of a turn as I’ve waited overnight before going to the ER with a broken wrist.
We called upon friends to come watch the kids while we were away and off we went. I thought arriving at the hospital would make me feel better but rather than alleviate my fears I became even more worried. The obvious concern of the nurse who wouldn’t let me out of her sight and the awareness of how difficult a time I had answering her very simple questions was extremely disconcerting.
For the first time in my entire life rather than go out to the waiting room I was brought straight into the emergency ward. After some testing and a ct scan I was told I had a small fracture in my skull and a bad concussion. Nothing they could do about it, the brain fog and mounting headache would fade over time and they sent us home.
It took me almost a month to feel completely myself again but from that day forward the feelings I’d had when at my most confused and disoriented haunted me. It still worries me and I’m much more cautious particularly when skating.
See why this is on my mind today is that I’ve been feeling foggy today. The feeling I believe is a result of having been sick with one cold than another and finally a flu in the past three weeks. I'm sure it has nothing to do with hitting my head and that it is simply the cumulative effect of being sick and unable to sleep well but never the less my mind wanders back.
