I know that this a bit long, however i am writing a memior of what it was like recovering from a brain injury i suffered 2 years ago. The actual story will not be so choppy. This is how i woke up. Grammar aside what do you think?
A sharp pain jolts me awake from a sound sleep. I open my eyes and inbetween my legs I am covered in blood. As I lift my head slightly off the pillow my world begins to spin. Where am I? What is this pain?
“Doctor, she’s awake”
“Already? With all that we gave her?”
My eyes are focusing now but the pain is so intense I can barely think, I don’t know where I am. I reach up to touch my head, where this aching is coming from. It is swollen, and elevated. I silently count 1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8,9,10,11,12,13,14,15. 15 what?
“They are staples, do you know where you are”
No I say, but she doesn’t hear me, I say NO louder and nothing. The lights are so bright it is burning my eyes.
“Kendra, you are in O.R. Do you remember me?”
I do, yes I do! You gave me a shot, you held my hand.
“Kendra, can you speak?”
Speak? I am! I am speaking, what is going on?
“Ok sweetie, why don’t you try and get some rest, here’s a little something for the pain”
No, I want to know what is happening
The burn spreads from my right arm throughout my body, and then the numbness kicks in…I am falling, swimming and flying all at the same time. We are going through a hallway, the lights again are bright. Anger wells up inside inside of me, just as I am about to scream, kick, fight and run away…
I wake up. In a warm bed. I look around the room at the strange faces. I can hear them talking but they don’t know it. They all look afraid, I wish they would leave.
I catch a woman’s eye and she smiles a vaguely familiar smile, and runs to my side. Within seconds I am surrounded and the nurse is being paged.
The next hour or so goes by in a flash, faces meshing together, voices so loud I need them to stop! Please stop talking I say, they cant hear me I don’t understand. I ball up my fist and I start to scream obsenities. No one notices.
Then like a rock my head is slammed against my brain. And I remember, I remember everything.
In line for the bathroom, the push, the fall, the embarresment. The ambulance, going home, waking up. Back at the hospital, 36 hours no food, no water, puking in the bathroom, Titanium plate in the head…
That’s it! They put a metal plate in my head. The surgeon who I joking called Jamaican Santa Claus. The notery, the living will, my mother boarding her first plane to get here immediately, Noemi crying day and night. I remember it all.
She is holding my hand and I say, I remember…
“Ken, Smoop, your not speaking. Your lips are moving but nothing is coming out. Baby are you ok?”
The pain is back, the panic, the crushing in my chest and my mind is gone, gone, but where is it going?…
I am 11 years old, its Halloween. Adam and I had slept at Liz’s house because Mom had go to the doctor. I am going to be the Devil. My costume is terrifying. Wait until my classmates see the new girl. I have the best costume!
Where are the girls? Amber and Briana are not in their beds. In the next room Katie is not in hers. Adam is fast asleep on the floor where I left him as I run into the kitchen. There is Liz crying over a cup of coffee.
“Where are the girls? We are late for school.”
“Kendra come here, your mother is in hospital, The University of Michigan, something is wrong. They don’t yet know what. Kendra I am so sorry. Your aunt Trisha is going to come pick you and your brother up, and take you to her house”
“What happened? Is this because of her headaches?”
“I think so dear, but I honestly don’t know”
I go back into the bedroom to try to explain to my 5 year old brother what has just been told to me. Adam being more sensitive then I immediately starts to cry. I think, its just her headaches she will be fine. I on the otherhand am going to miss the costume party.
For 2 hours I pout in front of the TV awaiting my aunt to pick us up.
When Trisha finally arrives she tells me that my mother is in surgery. They found a tumor in her brain
The room is spinning, I am sweating and shaking when my eyes begin to focus there are nurses all around me. What was that? Some kind of intense flashback. I don’t remember that. I don’t remember a tumor. Who is Liz?
I start to think, and I have no childhood, I have no yesterday. I have a fall at a concert, and a Halloween 15 years ago. Where is the rest of my life?
My name is Kendra. Now I realize I know that because they told me. This is my mother. I know that because they said your mom is here. Noemi is my girlfriend? I smile to myself when the realitization that I am a lesbian is revealed to me. She is holding my hand. She calls me Smoop, it sounds familiar. What is happening? I realize that everything I know, has been told to me in this last hour. Why do I remember Adam?