Excerpt From 'Roller Coaster Ride With Brain Injury (For Loved Ones)'

Not Taking It Personally

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"The following morning I came downstairs about fifteen minutes after him. He was sitting at the dining room table playing solitaire. I made him a breakfast of scrambled eggs and toast and placed it on the table in front of him.

"I've already eaten."

Looking around I saw nothing to indicate that he had eaten. "You have to eat Larry. You didn't have dinner last night."

Baring his teeth and glaring at me he said, "If I want to eat, I'll eat. If I don't want to eat, I won't." Gathering up his bills, he growled, "You can drop me off at the bank."

Looking at the snow and the ice on the sidewalks and he with his crutches, I said, "I'll wait for you. It's dangerous to walk in this stuff with your crutches."

"I'm not coming back and you can wait until you're blue in the face. I'm going someplace else."

He got out of the car and without much alternative, I came home. I then called the ICBC therapist.

.......

After speaking with him, his therapist said that his biggest thing was that all of his independence had been taken away from him and I'm one of the ones who had taken it away and who was telling him what to do. He was also angry by the fact that his license had been removed. She told him she would organize a taxi account for him so he could go to the clinic and to his doctor appointments on his own so he would feel more independent. He said he didn't want me helping him with things - he wanted me to 'butt out'. She said if he refused to take his medication that they would send someone to give it to him so I wouldn't have to get into an altercation with him. As a final comment she said, "Don't take it personally."

Although that is what everyone says, it is difficult not to take it personally when a person is looking directly at you with anger and hatred on his face. I do believe, if only at that moment, there is a personal nature to it.