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

Anger and Frustration

"Day sixty-one was the beginning of some more new changes. Around this time Larry's frustration and anger were becoming very specifically directed at me. On this particular day when I got to the hospital he was cranky and complained about the therapist not knowing what she was doing; about them doing nothing for him; how he had to sit and twiddle his thumbs all day watching the sun come up and the sun go down; that he hadn't gone for a walk; and that now they were putting cream on his feet and legs for no reason.

"We're doing it because you have a fungus," one nurse told him patiently as she liberally spread the cream onto his legs and feet.

Shrugging, he said, "Well, knock your socks off then."

......... "That same week Larry went for x-rays. "Good news," he greeted me when I arrived at the hospital. "I can't weight bear for four more weeks but the doctor said I can probably go home next week."

My heart almost stopped beating at the prospect of bringing him home. I wasn't ready for him to come home while he was in his present state of mind. I didn't know if I could hold up to twenty-four hours of nasty treatment and being talked to like I was nothing more than a rat in his garbage.

"But I can't watch you twenty-four hours a day to make sure you don't injure your leg. You can't be trusted not to put your weight on it. If you could guarantee me that you would do as you are supposed to do and wouldn't be nasty to me, it would be a different story." (The comment about going home was made by the orthopedic surgeon who had no idea what his behavior had been like; he had been speaking from a surgical point of view).

"I can't guarantee you that," he told me. "I am not going to stay in the hospital for another four weeks. Everyone around here seems to be more concerned about you than they are about me." He continued to be argumentative, unreasonable, sulky, self-centered and complaining.

His nasty treatment of me was becoming increasingly difficult to handle and I spent most of each day either in tears or near to tears."