* UPDATED 3-20-2014
I'm a pirate! "Arrr...."
Not really, but sometimes it looks that way. Social media has it set up so that you can have a free profile and a few extras. Like a pirate, I take full advantage of this. I started with a profile at MySpace, http://www.myspace.com/angelar70 I also had a group there. It became one of the largest. As social networks can go, though, most of this did. MySpace closed all its groups.There was a large exodus of people from MySpace. Luckily, I had something set up at Facebook, https://www.facebook.com/people/Angela-Ronson/1064010358 This has now become a major source of brain injury dissemination of information. I also had a Twitter, https://twitter.com/#!/angelar70 Twitter has become a source of connections. It's also where you can see the latest me, usually daily, sometimes hourly. My latest venture is the new Google+ https://plus.google.com/114061315171466252323/posts
Knowing that things can disappear, I looked for something that should last for my blog. I chose Blogger by Google, knowing Google was a large, strong company. I currently have 2 blogs going, http://braininjuryknow.blogspot.com/ is sort of a 'how to' for other brain injury sufferers. It gives directions, suggestions, concerns, etc-the things a person (or family) with a brain injury need to know. The other is http://thoughtfulveg.blogspot.com/ which is thought, theories, and whatever else.
So who am I?
This is a picture that is more current. This next one is from early on in the injury. I had to get special permission to leave the hospital to attend a birthday party at Chuck E. Cheese, and my mother had to get special medical training.
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This is me before the injury. I'm almost back to that. (Just a little older)
A person like me shouldn't be able to do any of this. My initial account of my injury is in page 9 of Stroke Connection magazineTechnically, I should have stayed in the hospital another few years and gotten out much later, if not still be in a care situation. I was aware enough to live on my own and didn't want to make another Medicaid move.
Before all this happened I worked in disability, primarily children. So I knew what services there were... and were not. I knew adults had less. As I've found out, if your disability happens as an adult, what's there is almost nothing.So, I could find what I needed, but being able to express that was an issue as I could only make sounds but not speak.
This leads me to my condition. If you want to know what happened it is stated in http://www.strokeassociation.org/idc/groups/stroke-public/@wcm/@hcm/@mag/documents/downloadable/ucm_463065.pdf I wasn't medically stable. Sure I looked fine most of the day, but it was like a gamble in the next minute as I might need life saving procedures. Especially when I still had that thing in my head. (I had an AVM that could bleed in my brain.)
I started out only able to open my eyes. I could hear, though, and understood.(I understood more than thought because staff didn't know my training.) I started moving my left-not that great, but it moved. It's taken some time to get it purposeful. Right before I left that rehab I started making sounds. They must not have believed their ears, because they put a camera down my nose to look at my vocal cords. That was one of my last speech sessions for years. I left that hospital after a few months when my insurance ran out. I then began a trek across my state going from place to place because I had the government's medical coverage and a permanent placement couldn't be found. In my total time I was hospitalized, I saw 5 hospitals, 1 long-term care facility, and 2 nursing homes (licensed and not). I'm now in my own home. (I do want to state that unlicensed is illegal and don't take your chances.)
Not really, but sometimes it looks that way. Social media has it set up so that you can have a free profile and a few extras. Like a pirate, I take full advantage of this. I started with a profile at MySpace, http://www.myspace.com/angelar70 I also had a group there. It became one of the largest. As social networks can go, though, most of this did. MySpace closed all its groups.There was a large exodus of people from MySpace. Luckily, I had something set up at Facebook, https://www.facebook.com/people/Angela-Ronson/1064010358 This has now become a major source of brain injury dissemination of information. I also had a Twitter, https://twitter.com/#!/angelar70 Twitter has become a source of connections. It's also where you can see the latest me, usually daily, sometimes hourly. My latest venture is the new Google+ https://plus.google.com/114061315171466252323/posts
Knowing that things can disappear, I looked for something that should last for my blog. I chose Blogger by Google, knowing Google was a large, strong company. I currently have 2 blogs going, http://braininjuryknow.blogspot.com/ is sort of a 'how to' for other brain injury sufferers. It gives directions, suggestions, concerns, etc-the things a person (or family) with a brain injury need to know. The other is http://thoughtfulveg.blogspot.com/ which is thought, theories, and whatever else.
So who am I?
This is a picture that is more current. This next one is from early on in the injury. I had to get special permission to leave the hospital to attend a birthday party at Chuck E. Cheese, and my mother had to get special medical training.
This is me before the injury. I'm almost back to that. (Just a little older)
A person like me shouldn't be able to do any of this. My initial account of my injury is in page 9 of Stroke Connection magazineTechnically, I should have stayed in the hospital another few years and gotten out much later, if not still be in a care situation. I was aware enough to live on my own and didn't want to make another Medicaid move.
Before all this happened I worked in disability, primarily children. So I knew what services there were... and were not. I knew adults had less. As I've found out, if your disability happens as an adult, what's there is almost nothing.So, I could find what I needed, but being able to express that was an issue as I could only make sounds but not speak.
This leads me to my condition. If you want to know what happened it is stated in http://www.strokeassociation.org/idc/groups/stroke-public/@wcm/@hcm/@mag/documents/downloadable/ucm_463065.pdf I wasn't medically stable. Sure I looked fine most of the day, but it was like a gamble in the next minute as I might need life saving procedures. Especially when I still had that thing in my head. (I had an AVM that could bleed in my brain.)
I started out only able to open my eyes. I could hear, though, and understood.(I understood more than thought because staff didn't know my training.) I started moving my left-not that great, but it moved. It's taken some time to get it purposeful. Right before I left that rehab I started making sounds. They must not have believed their ears, because they put a camera down my nose to look at my vocal cords. That was one of my last speech sessions for years. I left that hospital after a few months when my insurance ran out. I then began a trek across my state going from place to place because I had the government's medical coverage and a permanent placement couldn't be found. In my total time I was hospitalized, I saw 5 hospitals, 1 long-term care facility, and 2 nursing homes (licensed and not). I'm now in my own home. (I do want to state that unlicensed is illegal and don't take your chances.)
When the long-term care unit in a hospital I was at was closing, I took the opportunity to push for going home. Like I have said, I could have stayed in a little longer, but you can see I'm alright. Not only alright, but considerably improved. I've taken to the internet. It's quite lengthy now, but I started at the University of West Georgia's. It had a rare neurological disorders group. At the time there wasn't much. Now there's a lot more. Since then, computer technology has grown, and so have I.
* That picture of me before my injury is just what my appearance will closely be like. I will just be older and have a hole in my neck. What you look like on the outside is not necessarily what's going on in the inside. What's going on in my head doesn't look like that picture. The last ten years doesn't look like that picture.
* A picture of me in the last year (this is 2013). The link in the comments:
* That picture of me before my injury is just what my appearance will closely be like. I will just be older and have a hole in my neck. What you look like on the outside is not necessarily what's going on in the inside. What's going on in my head doesn't look like that picture. The last ten years doesn't look like that picture.
* A picture of me in the last year (this is 2013). The link in the comments:
You know Angela since i have not met you in person, my mental picture of you always returns to it's default which is a darling gal, obviously bright, feisty and full of potential mischief. Like when one is stuck at a stuffy gathering bored to tears and you catch the sparkling eye of that one stranger and they wink - you know you have found a kindred spirit who doesn't buy into all the BS.You head their way hoping you will be able to entice them to slip out the side door with you and stir up some real fun.
ReplyDeleteWell in my mind I see you as just that person, you rock.
This is a current picture of me, https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=10202207246636980&set=t.1064010358&type=1&theater I don't have an eye patch like a pirate, but I used to. (That's due to neuroplasticity.)
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