Up at 0700. My body feels as if it has been steamrollered. I fast walked more than 10 miles yesterday, divided between two sessions, pushing hard on both occasions. During the walks, I contemplated the possible role of self-efficacy in responding to my TBI injury.
Discovery of the concept of self-efficacy was the byproduct of another recent search. A phrase caught my eye:
People generally avoid tasks where self-efficacy is low, but undertake tasks where self-efficacy is high.
(Source: Wikipedia)
When I read this, I understood it to give insight into the way TBI has restructured my life and the reason my present day life routines are so different from my past life routines. What follows is a lay interpretation and application of a psychological concept. I suspect I may be over reliant on self-efficacy as an explanatory mechanism and very much wish to review my understanding with Dr D. Still, the basic concept seems to be a good fit with my experience. First, some chronology.
The period subsequent to the accident can be divided into four distinct phases. The demarcation between these phases is fuzzy. There was no sharp transition. The transition occurred over a period of weeks, or months. The calender dates provided below are an approximation only.
1) Accident until Problem Recognition
Approximate time period March 2011 to May 2012
I am unsure how to characterize this period apart from the fact that I was engaged in a full time job hunt. This job search proceeded in a slow, methodical, and deliberative way. It required an inordinate amount of time to create and submit an application, followed by daily headaches and “fatigue sleep.” I would characterize this period as my “being out of it.”
This period is described in the following blog post:
I have just performed an intensive search of the entire blog. I had the belief that I had written about the period immediately following the accident. If I did, this description did not make it into the blog. What is very apparent from reviewing over a year’s worth of posts is the degree to which the blog focuses on immediate events and seeks to characterize and describe the circumstance within a 24 hour period of the post date. In essence, the blog is extremely concrete and fixed on the immediate present.
2) Initial Problem Recognition to Personal Identification of TBI Issues
Approximate dates July 2012 to crisis of March / April 2013
My first inkling that something was wrong did not occur until late spring 2012. Three distinct cues triggered an awareness of an unspecified problem. I did not yet see myself as being injured. All I did have were a series of observations that “did not compute.” These were:
My income support was coming to an end and I felt no stress whatsoever. This was in contrast to events that had first led me to see Dr D a few years previously. In these prior events the mere rumour of job loss had resulted in severe panic attacks. I was now experiencing the exact event foretold by the rumour yet I faced it with complete equanimity. I was unable to resolve this variance in my behaviour.
I would touch one part of my body and experience pain in a remote, distant part of my body, well away from the point of contact. This was first experienced in the months after the accident but had then ceased. For unknown reasons it suddenly recommenced. I found this experience to be very strange and had no explanation for it.
In an attempt to secure employment, I volunteered to perform work similar to that which I had performed for the prior 12 years. This volunteer activity involved a much less demanding environment, and a less complex set of tasks. I found myself unable to perform at this lower level despite the fact I had excelled in similar work with task demands that were much more severe. I had no explanation for this but it bothered me greatly.
The trigger event for this awareness was the realization that I was extremely forgetful, that I would lose task focus and suddenly lack all awareness of what it was I was trying to accomplish. On reflection, I realized that I had experienced this set of problems for an extended period of time.
When I first saw Dr D, and Dr H, and was diagnosed with TBI, I did not believe this diagnosis. It had no experiential value for me. It was not until I attempted to undertake a series of tasks for a local non-profit in the period January / February 2013 that I fully recognized that my ability to perform was severely compromised. I had a strong negative emotional reaction to this awareness resulting in a crisis in March / April 2013.
3) Exploration and Cataloguing of Limits
From March 2013 to December 2014
March 2013 marks the initiation of this blog. The blog serves both as a chronicle of my experience, and as a functional exploratory / investigative tool permitting the cataloguing of my experience, and assisting with an improved understanding / interpretation / comprehension of the behavioural impacts of TBI injury.
What is most interesting in a review of the blog entries is the presence of flashes of insight demonstrating an awareness of aspects of the injury. These insights were not linked into any form of comprehensive understanding. The general focus of the blog is on concrete experience, and temporal immediacy.
4) Acquisition of Self-Efficacy
From January 2014 to Present
This period overlaps with the prior period. During this period I made the conscious decision to take control of both my injury, and my rehabilitation. I remember Dr H making a remark on this point “That you are undertaking your own rehabilitation program.” I heard the words but did not fully understand what she meant until today. In February 2014 I made the conscious decision to address the TBI problem, documented in this post:
This represents the re-actualization and utilization of self-agency and my independent problem solving streak.