29 Aug 2016
Do not answer the question with another question. Although trite, I have yet to find an answer that is not immediately followed by more questions. Perhaps I’m just an inquisitive person, or perhaps I just ask too many questions. Life however is constantly asking for answers, and just answers alone. When asked about my future as a student and a professional, my brain swirls like a gumball machine, and I wait twirl after twirl for the next question to drop, chew on, and then digest. This gumball machine brain may be where my career confusion originates.
To the average human being, a shower has no lasting effect. Perhaps they sing a slightly embarrassing rendition of the radio’s latest hit, or forget to scrub behind their ears, but once towel dried, the shower ends up just another part of the day. Showers and I do not have such a honkey-dory relationship as I acquired a serious brain contusion from a slight misstep out of one. My misstep landed me directly into intense therapy sessions in Physical, Occupational, and Speech. As I could not walk and state my name, I resembled a 6 year old version of my previous honor’s society, self.
I yelled throughout the house in search of family members that were not home. I asked identical questions repeatedly within an hour. I forgot my home address. I didn’t know how to hold a pencil, let alone write with one. I was incapable of remaining calm and completely out of character lashed out violently at the ones I loved. I was not Amanda.
With time, patience, anger, and fear for my future, I began to reclaim my motor skills. Picking things up, placing them down, following a finger from left to right. These seemingly effortless tasks were unfathomable victories that showed my progress. Remembering that blue and yellow make green and translating such in a sentence, written on paper, with my own hand and a pencil was an unprecedented feat. Therapy 5 days a week, for months upon months not only brought back my brain as I knew it, but changed me as a person.
Pre-brain injury Amanda would be able to recite her 5 year plan, 10 year plan, down to the minute details of her graduation shoes. Post brain injury Amanda is just happy to be typing, applying, learning and discussing the option of a potential career. These small things I consider blessings have also prompted me to understand how proud anyone should feel as they enter the doors of a class room.
Why are you here? How did you get here? Have you struggled to sit in this seat? Are you excited to learn? Gumball after gumball. I have goals, I want to own a business, I want to write a children’s book, I want to be brilliant, I want to travel the world, and my education will help me achieve these things that have not always been promised. I am ambitious, determined, and hungry for success to achieve the things Pre-Brain-Injury Amanda took for granted before. I am a student that eats up every bit of her education, chews on it, and then, well, asks a lot of questions.