society Archives - Jumbledbrain

Why you’re wrong if you brand a brain injury survivor as toxic

Michelle #jumbledbrain — Thu, 20 May 2021 16:15:29 +0000

Social media is full of ideas and there are a lot of people who try to remind others to look after themselves. That is an important message as we can’t pour from an empty cup, i.e. if we have used up all our energy and not replenished it we have nothing else to give. I think we all can appreciate this sentiment. But what I get more concerned about is when I see people throw around words which have become the latest trend to use that encourage people to brand others as something rather than try to understand them. The word I’m particularly concerned about is toxic.

How easy it is for the brain injury survivor to be unfairly labelled as toxic.

I know one former friend stopped talking to me because she “needed to surround herself with uplifting people who reflect her kind of energy.” This happened within the first year of my recovery process. If you have been following me for a while you will know that I was also grieving the death of my mum and trying to help my dad cope as he declined with Alzheimer’s. I fully admit that I wasn’t much fun at that point in my life and I probably didn’t offer much support with what she was facing at the time as my plate was already over flowing with trauma. Maybe I talked too much about how I felt my life had fallen apart and burdened her too much with it all. This wasn’t someone I saw a lot of so it’s not like she had to hear it every week, and I guess we just weren’t as close as I thought. Honestly I’m fine with us going on our different paths, that’s just life. But what I don’t relish, is the realisation that what she was actually doing was branding me as a form of toxic.

What is a “toxic” person and why a survivor shouldn’t wear this label.

It appears that there are a few different behaviours which are being called toxic. I want to run through them and explain how a survivor may well behave like this at times but why it’s just ignorant to brand them as toxic.

THE CONVERSATIONAL NARCISSIST – Someone who talks about themselves a lot, rarely asks the other person any questions, appearing that they are more interested in themselves and what is going on their life at that time.

WHY THIS DOESN’T MAKE A BRAIN INJURY SURVIVOR “TOXIC” – When you have gone through a major trauma your body and brain go into “fight or flight mode”. You might find that you’re more jumpy than you were before as your system is on constant alert for danger. But also you’re brain is trying to analyse what you have been through, unpicking all the little details in hope that it an find a way it put it right again and keep you safe from it happening again. This is a behaviour I have no doubt that I displayed a lot with my former friend without realising it. I can tell you that this doesn’t mean that I didn’t care about her, just that I thought as we were friends she would be willing to help me through all the thoughts and emotions I was being bombarded with at the time.

THE EMOTIONAL VAMPIRE – Someone who will find a negative angle in most situations. They are often sad and pessimistic which can take the wind out of the other persons sails.

WHY THIS DOESN’T MAKE A BRAIN INJURY SURVIVOR “TOXIC” – Whilst we are still processing the trauma we have been through our brain will continue to look for signs of “danger” in any given situation. It is looking to avoid any more drama, disappointment or heartache as well as physical danger. This is another behaviour I know I was guilty of with my former friend. She had just become an Arbonne consultant which she was doing whilst continuing with her very successful career in another area. I listened to the sales pitch she gave me about why I should sign up as a consultant which the lady who’d signed my friend up chipping in on too. I was worried about investing in something that was designed to make others rich and explained how I thought this was a pyramid scheme. Actually, it’s a multi-level marketing (MLM) business. The only difference between a MLM and a pyramid scheme is an MLM has an actually product to sell. However, they both rely on each new level recruiting new consultants. The higher levels take a percentage of the sales from every consultant they have recruited, so the higher up you are the more money you make. But those at the bottom of the pile often just invest money buying the products and may never make money. So yes, I did rain on her party and she probably didn’t like to way I did it in front of this other lady. But when you are still in “fight or flight mode” from your brain injury it can only be expected that like a cornered animal you will either look for a way out, or will bare your teeth.

THE FIBBER – Someone who regularly embellishes, exaggerates or just claims things that just aren’t true. This is seen as being wrapped up in their own self importance, attention seeking and dishonest.

WHY THIS DOESN’T MAKE A BRAIN INJURY SURVIVOR “TOXIC” – Often brain injury survivors can confabulate, which is where the brain can try to fill in the gaps in our memory with things that didn’t happen or aren’t accurate. (You can read more about these in Confabulation is not lying. False memories due to brain injury.) We genuinely believe these confabulations, so whilst our brains are lying to us, we are not being dishonest when we relay them to other people. We think they are real and the truth. Yes this might be a little wearing for others to try to unpick what is accurate, but we don’t mean to cause any harm.

THE CONTROL FREAK – They have lots of rules to follow for different situations, such as the environment you meet in (lighting, background noise etc.) Plus when they disagree with you about something they won’t stop trying to convince you that they are right.

WHY THIS DOESN’T MAKE A BRAIN INJURY SURVIVOR “TOXIC” – Many of the rules a brain injury survivor is trying to impose on a situation, are actually their coping mechanisms. They may suffer with noise and light sensitivity and these rules help them to manage their fatigue and avoid additional pain. I have been that party pooper who has begged someone to turn the music down which wasn’t even loud. There can be just a particular vibration or pitch that just overloads the injured brain of a survivor. Think about it, if a wheelchair used said they could only meet somewhere with that’s wheelchair accessible you wouldn’t think they were being controlling, just asking you to make choices which means they can safely join in.

If we disagree with you and won’t let it go, that could be us struggling with our slow processing. Sometimes with the damaged pathways it can take us long to take something in and analyse it properly. That might mean we keep pushing back because it doesn’t sound right to us. We might eventually agree with you once the brain has mulled on it for a while, or we might still not agree with you. A brain injury doesn’t mean we’re stupid or that you know better than us. It could be just that on that occasion you’re wrong and we’re trying to do you a favour. We might have lost the filter that would kick in and tell us to accept that you’re never going to agree and so change the subject. Yes that can make the situation uncomfortable, but in most cases in time we can regain this skill so don’t write us off.

THE DRAMA MAGNET – They are always complaining that something is wrong. Offering advice doesn’t help, and the moment one crisis has been resolved, another comes along.

WHY THIS DOESN’T MAKE A BRAIN INJURY SURVIVOR “TOXIC” – Again this comes back to the trauma a brain injury survivor has been through. Many of the things they are conveying are because their life has been turned upside down. Often it has cost them their career as well as their health, and unfortunately a loss of income effects virtually everything. When in this situation it’s difficult to look ahead and plan so you’re stuck in this moment, scared of what is coming next. Just like it’s not helpful to tell someone with a chronic illness to “just try going vegan”, without understanding their condition, unprofessional advice might not be supportive. We’re not always looking for you to resolve it for us. Talking about our worries can help us process the emotions and we might privately find a way later which is in part thanks to you offering a non-judgemental ear.

Please be careful when using these terms to brand someone as a bad person.

You might not be able to cope with the behaviour that a brain injury survivor has started to display as a result of their injury, and of course your mental health is just as important. If that’s the case I agree that you need to back away until you are in a position to deal with them in a healthy way, or that they have recovered a little more. But please don’t throw around terms like toxic as it’s unhelpful to brand people like this. A brain injury is a disability, but with the right support we still have a lot to offer and shouldn’t be discriminated against.

As a brain injury survivor have you ever been branded as toxic? What do you wish people understood about why you do the things that you do?

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Living with a brain injury in an ableist society

Michelle #jumbledbrain — Thu, 20 Feb 2020 18:32:39 +0000

I don’t like trending buzzwords much as they always leave a sour taste in my mouth where it feels like people are just being quick to jump on the latest bandwagon. That’s why I’ve been reluctant to bring up the subject of how much of the modern world is still behaving as an ableist society…. that is until now. Yes I’ve spoken before in Living with invisible disability, brain injury about how having an invisible disability can mean both able bodied and disabled people can misjudge you, but the other day I witnessed something that proved to me how far some people still have to come in their understanding of those for are not like them.

Trigger warning: This level of ignorance I’m about to describe is likely to upset some.

I’m very active on Twitter and often tweet about brain injury and many other forms of chronic illness (if you don’t already you can follow me via @michelle_munt.) The other day I retweeted an announcement of the company that a guest blog for that the latest blog post by another of their guest bloggers was now available to read. The blogger, Lauren has a spinal injury and so we blog about different things but as CFG Law is a law firm for personal injury they are keen to highlight how the disabled community can cope with their injuries. The tweet said: “Laurens latest blog with @CfgLaw is now available and Laurens experience of care at home… #sci #careathome #cfglaw”.

Laurens spinal injury came from being hit by a van 11 years ago as she crossed the road at the wrong time. She was distracted and unfortunately stepped out and the driver couldn’t stop in time. The accident left her completely paralysed, but since 2016 she has set up and runs the charity Road Safety Talks Charity to raise awareness and better educate others. I haven’t had the opportunity to meet Lauren myself, but she sounds pretty awesome to me! I can’t begin to imagine the amount of work it takes to set up a charity. She also is a motivational speaker, so I take my hat off to her.

One particular response to this made me see the ableist society at its worst.

Now the tweet has been taken down so I can’t quote it, but one lady put “Rest in peace whether he recovered or not.” WTF? I did ask her what she meant by “rest in peace”, pointing out that Lauren is a female blogger, ie alive and SHE has a brain which she is putting to good use, but I never got a response.

Clearly this person didn’t read the article so didn’t understand Laurens situation, and this person isn’t one of my followers so I don’t know what her situation is either. But what shocked me about this was that she seemed to be implying that Lauren might as well be dead because of her disability. I had understood that some people may well think like this, particularly if they haven’t ever met someone who is doing so well in life despite their disability, but I never thought anyone would dare share this ignorant view so publicly. I mean it’s Twitter! Hello, now we all know how stupid you are!

This got me thinking about examples of ableism I’ve experienced that I might have overlooked.

Again on Twitter (sorry Twitter I mostly have a very positive experience of you and find the community very supportive so I don’t mean to make you look bad) a “well meaning” health coach responded to a tweet about my brain fog. I did mention I have a brain injury (because I do mention it constantly) but she still told me that if I changed my diet and lifestyle I could solve my problems, including brain fog. Symptoms like this, she told me, are just a reflection of the imbalance that I had created within my body.

Now don’t get me wrong, I do realise a healthy diet and active lifestyle can help, I’ve even advocated for this myself. But I have a brain injury, I have to fight against the imbalance in me every day! The structure of my brain is difference and so are the chemicals in it. This also gave me hypothyroidism and so my hormone levels are not where they need to be. But there isn’t a formula which I can follow everyday to correct these issues. Everyday is different, some days I’m doing well, and others I’m not. Living with a brain injury isn’t as simple as doing exercise and eating the right foods to remove symptoms such as brain fog.

As I didn’t have the energy for an argument, and because I knew she meant it in the nicest possible way, I just let it go. But actually I was hurt at the suggestion that my symptoms were my fault. You could say that as I was “complaining” about my brain fog she was trying to offer a solution, but as a fellow coach and blogger I don’t accept this. I’m a blogger who uses her experiences to offer a voice for other brain injury survivors and raise awareness, I’m not actually asking for a solution. Of course I am grateful of any new information others can offer, but simply blaming me for my struggles is not helpful. What’s more, it’s not even like we discussed my lifestyle for her to be able to identify what I might be doing wrong, it was just “obvious” to her that I MUST be doing it wrong to be experiencing these symptoms.

And then there was the guy who said “what, so people actually read your blog about brain injury?”

Ugh, honestly it was only because this guys behaviour made me think that he might either been damaged or was on the autistic spectrum that I didn’t roll my eyes at him. Yes, people read it. Just because you’re not interested, assume it’s boring, has no value or whatever, doesn’t mean that’s how the whole world feels. The idea that writing about how my life has changed due to my brain injury must have struck him as self centred. Why would anyone want to hear me droning on about it? The funniest part about this conversation was I’d hired him to clean my drive at the time. Yep, his idea of building rapport with his clients was to belittle them! You won’t be surprised when I tell you I never hired him again.

I’m sorry to say that there are people out there whose ideas of the world are very much stuck in the ableist society. Do I lose sleep over it? No. There will always be things that as individuals we can do better and ways in which we can expand our understanding of others. Just like I’m sure I understand very little about the tribes who live in the Amazon and are untouched by the modern world, there will always be some people who don’t understand the disabled community. I do believe that overall things are improving and we have to accept it’s a work in progress…. for now.

Have you experienced the ableist society? What can we do to improve attitudes?

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Brain injury survivor explains why your career isn’t your self-worth

Michelle #jumbledbrain — Tue, 29 Oct 2019 16:50:00 +0000

We are used to judging people by their profession: The customer service assistant, the doctor, the plumber, the football player, the chambermaid, the factory worker. And I’m willing to bet a significant number of people who just read those job titles felt less positively about the last 2 I mentioned because they aren’t as “successful” or “educated”. Or at least that’s what most of us think societies opinion is. So when we don’t have a current career because we have suffered a brain injury, we think others will be judging us because we aren’t good enough at something to be able to earn a salary.

When I had to give up my career I was asking the question “What is the point of me now? How do I add any value to anything?” Suddenly I was feeling a lack of self-worth worth after a brain injury. Hands up who else felt like this!

We like measurable actions, so being able to say your salary is X, indicates your value to society, right?

Wrong. But it’s pretty common to think that way. Doctors earn more because they have to have high intelligence to be able to learn and practice medicine, which the major of the population would not be able to do. The factor worker doesn’t need the same level of education and therefore a lot of people would find that they could perform this job. It’s a simple case of supply and demand, the more people who can perform a job, the less employers need to pay them because there’s more competition.

A job title does not say anything about if someone is a good person, and if their impact on their community is a good one.

It’s easy to assume that a doctor is someone who is having a positive impact. But that’s all it is, as assumption. Take Dr Harold Shipman who in 2000 was convicted here in England of the murder of 15 patients, but it’s believed around 250 people could have been victims of his over the span of his career.

Then there’s Didar Hossain who worked in a factory opposite the Rana Plaza building, Bangladesh, when it collapsed in 2013. He forced his way in to help people even though the authorities were trying to stop people for their own safety. He helped many people buried in the rubble, but he found a girl that they couldn’t release without amptating her hand. Didar alerted a doctor who replied “I can’t go in there, I’m frightened. You do it.” and handed him a knife and some anaesthetic to numb the area. Once he had cut the girls hand off and begun to lift her, another man begged him to cut his leg off so he too could be freed. Realising that he would die if he left him, he did as he’d asked. With both amputees tied to his body he slowly dragged them both out.

Now clearly these are extreme cases, but I think they demonstrate my point pretty well. You’re self-worth does not need to be tied to your career. We have the ability to make a difference whether we work or not. And that doesn’t have to be something as dramatic as what Didar did. It could just be listening to someone when they needed you, or making a child smile.

Thinking a career indicates your value to society is just a self limiting belief.

Now I’m sure most of us had families, teachers and mentors who encouraged us to realise our potential in life. But the reason they did this was so we could have good careers, LEADING TO a comfortable lifestyle. That means they were doing it to help you have a happy future. But because we are used to hearing about how “successful” others are, we end up confusing that with what society thinks of us.

If I did a pole asking you who would you rather invite to dinner and meet your family, Dr Harold Shipman or factory worker, Didar Hossain, I am certain Didar would win. (Alright, I know some of us would like to grill Shipman about “Who do you think you are?!” but you can’t because the coward killed himself shortly after his conviction.) Didar probably earns a modest wage and lives hand to mouth. His education is likely to be limited and it probably doesn’t take long to list his qualifications. But you’d rather have him meet your family because you know he’s a good man who acted to save the lives of others totally selflessly. He gained nothing, apart from friendship as he and the girl stayed in touch for years after the event.

I’m telling you this because I’ve been in the same boat.

Following my brain injury I had to give up my career at the ripe old age of 32. I felt washed up and a burden to my partner James. It took a long time for me to start to see that my value to the world has nothing to do with my job. (If you want to know more about how I bounced back, you can read about it on the page 6 weeks from surviving to thriving course.) How many of you reading this right now think my previous career has any relevance to the impact my writing has on you? I know I have touched on my career before, but I bet most of you don’t remember the details because it just doesn’t matter! It’s about how you make people feel, that’s what people remember, not words. As my job titles probably didn’t create an emotional response in you, so your brain just discarded it. But my honestly about my journey could have resonated with you, and so that’s what your brain decided to connect with.

If you’ve hit rock bottom, it’s a long journey back, but know the only way is up. Don’t feel alone, many survivors feel a lack of self-worth after a brain injury. I hope this will help you start to disentangle your self-worth from your career as I think for a lot of us that is a key starting point.

Has your brain injury affected your career? Do you feel that has had an impact on your self-worth?

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Stop judging me and my brain injury

Michelle #jumbledbrain — Mon, 30 Jan 2017 16:41:11 +0000

When meeting new people I try to go in with an open mind. So do many people. But all humans are imperfect, and old habits die hard. We instinctively are always looking for clues to show us a persons true colours. Most likely it’s part of our survival instinct as we try to establish friend from foe. We are trying to predict, analyse, understand, judge (the word you use to describe it is irrelevant) how their behaviour will affect us. Then we decide if that is something we think as good, nice, useful or bad, unattractive, disruptive to name a few.

Pigeonholing people

In the western world we have developed one particular shortcut to this process. Ones’ career. For example you might be more trusting of a Nurse or Teacher than a Motor trader. We think of the Nurse and Teacher as people who work for the good of others. Where as the Motor trader we think of wanting to profit out of others. But someone’s career doesn’t really tell you much about the individual, it just gives you a chance to stereotype them. (I’m not suggesting that those in the motor trade can’t be trusted. Read about how I embarrassed myself in front of a mechanic, but he didn’t comment in Can’t think fast enough.)

I always struggled with this because there was no short and simple answer to this question in my last job. My role at a Hairdressing academy for apprentices could not be explained in a sentence. Being acutely aware that people do a whole range of subconscious calculations I did my best to keep it short. Essentially I recruited students to the programme, helped them find a job in a hairdressing salon and maintained a working relationship with both the employer and student. It was a mix of business development, coaching, troubleshooting and agony aunt. So not so easy to judge, but perhaps I liked that. It was like a cliff hanger to a TV programme, you had to stay with it to find out what happens next.

Feeling like I’m trying to appeal to the Jury

Following my car accident my career ended. So now how do I answer the question about my career? I’m self employed so I can decide each day how much I am able to do, and my last job as an employee takes more than a job title to explain it. (Even that was complicated – Student Liaison and Employer Engagement Manager.) Instead I’m unemployed. Well that’s a conversation killer in itself. I try to defend this by explaining I was in a bad car accident. As I look fine I feel the need to go on and explain about my brain injury. This is all in an effort to avoid the conclusion that they judge me as lazy or useless.

I’m not looking for sympathy, I’m just trying to stop myself being written off. But now they have to decide how this new, and unexpected information makes them feel.

(A) Really, surely you could do something? Still judge you as lazy.
(B) Oh I thought you were intelligent? Well I better dumb everything down now I know that.
(C) Oh wow! I would never have guessed! Amazing!
(D) I was just trying to make polite conversation, now I’ve got to pretend I care. Wish I’d never asked.

The only solution I can think of is to raise awareness

Brain injuries happen much more than many people would imagine. Most of us will at some point know someone who has suffered a brain injury. What we need to help people realise is that it doesn’t mean the end, but you can’t judge someone for it. Every person will have a unique experience and in most cases that means good days and bad days. So trying to judge someone by their career doesn’t really help. Their bad days might make their career options limited. But their good days might leave you for dust.

Do you feel we put too much weight on someone's career/ Do you think people judge you badly after your brain injury?

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