Stress Tolerance

I have been looking forward to writing this Blog ever since I saw that we had to write about it.

I hate to include my TBI into so many of these blogs, but it is a part of who I am, and it has given me an entirely knew perspective on life.

Stress is a natural feeling that everyone feels/goes through from time to time. Having a brain injury and the deficits that come with it only multiplies the amount of stressful situations I have been in/gone through. Early on (after my injury) I had a psychologist that helped with me to deal with this stress. For the last two years I have been on my own. When I get stressed or even overwhelmed, I often take a step back and think about positive things or why I am doing something and I remind myself to breath/and to count to ten. Usually while I am counting to ten the thought(s) that go through my mind are:: "Should this really be stressing me out?" and "Somebody, somewhere, has it worse than me." Often this calms me down and clears my head.
A good friend of mine who was often stressed out, and would over-react and get extremely angry got a tattoo on the inside of his forearm that read "Breathe". He said that every time he got angry or stressed he would look at his arm as a reminder to breathe and relax. At the time I thought that to be a little extreme because tattoos are often frowned upon, especially if they are visible. Now I like this idea, and I will probably do the same. I am not a fan of tattoos generally, but because I have to get one, I might as well copy this strategy because it has been very beneficial for him. On my left wrist I have to get a medical symbol tattooed on me that indicates that I have a metal filter in my right femoral artery and that i cannot have a full strength MRI. So if I get a full strength MRI, the metal filter will be literally ripped from my body (because of the magnetic force) and will likely kill me because of the massive blood loss.  This tattoo could be used the way my friend uses his tattoo. For me it would represent that, sure I had a TBI but I also had a miraculous recovery and there is always somebody else who has it worse than I do.
Ultimately I think its important for people to realize that Stress is a natural part of life, and people should learn to manage it rather than completely avoid it.