The Things We Don’t Give Ourselves Credit For

I survived a traumatic brain injury. Then, years later, I survived a stroke.

I don’t think I always give myself enough credit for those two sentences.

Surviving isn’t just what happens in the hospital. It’s everything that comes afterward. It’s waking up the next morning and discovering what still works, what doesn’t, what has changed, and what you’re going to have to learn to do differently.

It’s adapting.

It’s getting frustrated.

It’s figuring things out again.

It’s accepting some limitations while refusing to let those limitations define everything about you.

When you’ve lived with something long enough, it can start feeling ordinary because it has become your ordinary. You stop thinking about everything it took to get here.

But today I’m giving myself credit.

I survived a traumatic brain injury.

I survived a stroke.

And I’m still here, living my life and writing the next part of the story.

That’s something I damn well deserve to give myself credit for.