This is an extension of my previous post.

The lightbulb moment for me happened a couple of weeks ago. I've been reading the board and saying to myself "Yeah, that sucks.... I have that.... I remember when I was going through that...." Ok, so did I have a stroke and not know about it?!? I sat for a while and thought back to when my problems had started. In fact they have shown some signs of getting worse over the past couple of years, but they really started right after the accident.

Growing up I heard all the reasons for why I was having problems in life. I was "slow", I was lazy, I wasn't applying myself, I was just imagining things, I was stupid. Right after the accident until I was about 5 years old I had to wear braces on my legs to walk. The reason according to the doctor was the way I was sitting. So, bad posture caused walking problems? Of course when I couldn't concentrate or had problems focusing on something I was being lazy.

When I started school at the age of 5 is when the school counselor realized there was something truly wrong with me. That's when I started the speach therapy sessions and some generall physicall therapy until I was 15. I don't know the reason my parents were given for me having therapy, I just know that I had it and it helped me a lot.

There have been several times I started to post on the board about my experiences and hardships with my brain injury once I figured it all out, but decided against it. I would felt like I was intruding by posting something that wasn't from a caregiver point of view on a stroke support sight. During the last Language Disorders chat I let slip some of the therapies I had done and cringed when I did. Thankfully the information was well recieved.

Some of the things I truly hate about brain injury is mixing my s and sh sounds up. Loosing concentration. And having problems with word retrival. It sucks when it's not a "tip of my tongue" situation, but one where a very familiar word just isn't there. I have to stop talking and concentrate of figuring out the word, but for all the good that does, I might as well have never knew the word in the first place.

In conclusion, I just want to say that this sight has been helpfull to me in figuring out I'm not stupid or lazy but I still have residual effects of a brain injury that happened all those years ago. Now I have to decide if it was better just accepting that I was "slow" or now knowing how it is all connected.