An unfortunate side effect of my brain injury is that I tend to blurt the first thing that comes to my mind instead of thinking before I speak. The first years after my brain injury, this got me into a lot of hot water. Since then, I've learned to adapt and manage my injury and most people who meet me now don't even know that I've had a traumatic brain injury, which is how I prefer it anyway.
Every now and then I slip up. I leave my filter/coping mechanism at home, or I "lose it" temporarily. Most of the time the people who see my slip ups are family members or close friends, so it's not as embarrassing for me. I didn't sleep well last night, and this morning I couldn't get my brain "jump started". I felt confused most of the morning and that feeling frustrates me a lot. It's a reminder of the first few weeks after my brain injury and it's a reminder that I don't like to have.
Anyway, I'm not going to go into great detail of what happened, but in a nutshell, a co-worker and close friend of mine mentioned to me a comment that another person had made concerning my character as well as the character of some of the other people I work with. It was 1) not nice & 2) not true. She wanted to let me know what was being said about me so I could put a stop to it. She knew that I had been nothing but nice and helpful to the person who was saying untrue things about me and knows what this person is really like (she has others fooled). This was the last straw and I saw "red" and exploded "crazy Jenna" in the office, thinking it was just the 2 of us in there.
I'm definitely not proud of my actions or the things I said. I know that once "crazy Jenna" was done with her explosion she felt better... until I heard the voice of my boss behind me say, "hey, can I get behind you?" Then, I was immediately ashamed of myself and embarrassed, because my actions were extremely out of character for myself and I have no idea how much he heard of what I said, especially since my language was fairly colorful. Needless to say, I beat a quick path out of the office in order to get my head back on straight.
So now I need to set things right...and I need to make sure I keep my filter with me. It was definitely a humbling day today.
Don't be so hard on yourself. He knows your character. I don't have a brain injury and you know I need a filter. Love you so much.
ReplyDeleteI agree. We all have moments like this. The key is to be humble and be yourself. My filter is not broken, I just decide sometimes not to use it. I'll be praying for you today.
ReplyDeleteThanks for the encouragement. I apologized to him this morning for being unprofessional. He didn't hear most of my rant about the person except for the, "I've never hated anyone I've worked with until this year, and I don't like that about myself" part, so none of the colorful language I had used in my explosion- not that that makes it better.
ReplyDeleteIf you fell down yesterday, stand up today.
ReplyDeleteHG Wells... Love, MOM
I have lost my filter many times and I don't have an excuse!
ReplyDelete