18. Sounds (Reprise)

Now I was left in my own room in the brain injury unit, I was back to hearing all that was going on, and not seeing it. Brain injury only had 8 patients at a time. 3 were in side rooms and 5 on the main ward. Because it was gender-split, and because men always seem to have a higher chance of having a brain injury, they were always in the ward, and women in the side rooms. When they brought me in, I was slightly afraid I was being put in a mental ward and that they would assume something was wrong with my cognition. (I had checked, and my childhood memories, recent memories and my memory of the whole script of The Simpsons Movie remained in tact). So, I implored the person bustling around my room, "I'm not crazy!"
She smiled, "I'll test you in the morning." Little did I know, she was only a health care assistant. (Over the next few weeks, I gradually worked out which uniform denoted which role. I was very proud of myself for working this out; no one told me.)

As I don't like watching TV, my main entertainment was sleeping. (I had a nap most days.) I couldn't read because my eyesight was a bit haywire, by I listened to music in the evenings. I would be waiting for the noises of other people's TVs to die down at night. (Some men had them on quite loud.) One man liked to listen to classical music before bed and at first I couldn't work out where the gentle harp music was coming from. Another man, brought onto the ward after me, had been hit by a car, and was shouting whenever he was touched. I once heard a staff member shriek, "Keep still! We're only trying to clean you, you've done a massive poo!" I found this lack of discretion somewhat amusing. He also kept shouting a woman's name, which I learnt was his daughter. I also learnt he had 2 daughters and 2 sons. I'm so curious as to why he had a favourite. After a week, he stopped shouting and became very normal.

Here for the first time, I was taken into the shower. A health care assistant called Eurica was the first to make the effort, and although a number bothered to, she took me regularly. I was hoisted into a large, supportive shower chair and taken in. We had to be careful not to get water in my mouth, as I was not safe to drink it. Of course, at one point, someone gave me the shower-head and it slipped in my (right) hand, so I sprayed my own face.

That first time Eurica took me in the shower, it took her half an hour just to brush out my hair. It had been washed in intensive care, in blow-up basins designed for people lying down, and plaited, but never brushed. It was quite a fuzz ball. I did joke, "Cut it all off!" but Eurica wouldn't be so easily conquered. She managed it, and plaited my hair in the double french plaits that became my signature hairstyle for a few months.

I had a rather strange visit from the doctor at about 8 am soon after arriving in the ward.  He left the light off because it would save elictricity. In the dim light, he softly exclaimed, "Why did this happen to you?"
I could have said a lot of things in reply looking back. Instead I very meekly answered, "I don't know." He asked me if I drank or did drugs. I said no. I was put down for an MRI.

When the time came, I was carted off in my whole bed.
To move me from my bed to the MRI scanner, they used an inflatable stretcher that blows up beneath you like a swimming pool inflatable, and was extremely fun. I think most people know what an MRI machine looks like. It's a big tube you are slid into. The purpose of the scan was to show the blueprint of my brain and to see a possible cause for the hemorrhage.The results were inconclusive as there was too much swelling. It was recorded I should have a repeat MRI after 3 months.

MRIs sound super clunky and shout lots of unecessary sounds at you. I was in it for about 40 minutes. I knew what an MRI was, but had never had one before, just CT scans. Because the main focus was my brain, my head was nestled in a plastic cuboid case, with a window in the middle for my face. I spent the time imagining I was in an old-fashioned diving suit being plunged deep into the sea, or an astronaut being blasted into space. I know you are supposed to stay very still, so you don't blur the results, but I was waiting so intently for the noise I full-body jumped when it came. I counted time for all the loud blip noises and gun-shot beeping, and fell into a deep trance in my efforts to keep still, holding my teddy's leg tightly. When I was being moved beds, they just left my dragon toy on my belly. I've seen the scan, and don't worry, it doesn't look like I am pregnant with a dragon.

"Can you plait my hair?" : My FAQ for the next few months.