Kaiten, part of my struggle remains using too many words, so I don't expect you to read this unless you really want to, because I feel that this is far too long and wordy. My apologies for that.
After reading the great responses my thoughts are entirely similar. The human brain can be a miracle in itself, and especially at your young age and presuming previous good health, other areas of your brain can begin to perform the functions that the injured parts of your brain may cause you to struggle with. My thoughts are that you're already an absolute success story and that your self-esteem, confidence, and cognition will in time come back better than you may presently believe possible.
It seems to me as if you set very high standards for yourself and that very excellent quality can occasionally also cause you to feel more self-doubt, anxiety, and to have disappointed expectations of yourself. Time-wise, while each bit of progress may feel very slow and painstaking, your really still in what I feel are the initial stages of recovery compared to the level of growth and gains in all areas that you appear likely to make happen just in the next 1-3 years. That is to say that you may well pick up increasingly greater speed in the "learning curve" of adapting and rehabilitating your mind,body and spirit as you keep forging ahead.
I feel that you're showing very good wisdom and judgment in the decisions to switch majors and recognize that for now, maybe you and math may not get along quite so well. It's been my personal experience that coming back from TBI happened quickly initially and has been unpredictable. For me it felt that after the quick initial recovery things slowed down and improvements felt like an impossible dream. Recently, now almost 8 years out, I've had the great surprise of gaining ground like a growth spurt in a boy's height or that of a young sapling tree.
I'm able to suddenly see and understand things that confused me or got in my way for so long. For me the biggest "reason" or cause was because my life circumstances changed and I HAD to either change quickly or just let go of hope. So in short order, I finally reached out and got an In Home Support Service worker and obtained the benefits of having some help that I've been entitled to any way the entire time. Even before the personal assistant showed, I met a woman that inspired me because she believed in me so much that I started believing I still had "it" in me to come back beyond what I'd allowed myself to believe was possible. It took a random chance meeting with a woman who believed in me at a time when I couldn't quite believe in myself.
What happened next has surprised me greatly. As soon as I started receiving just a few hours of help a week, it's as though I transformed into the core self of what I've always already had inside of me: not any cognition issue or head injury was what was holding me back: the loss of my self-esteem, self-confidence, stigma and shame, and especially, the LOSS OF RELATIONSHIPS had damaged me and hurt me worse than anything else. Having lost ALL my freinds and being rejected by everyone in my family was absolutely emotionally devastating.and by far the WORST part of the fall out from the catastrophic accident.
Making it even harder was that about 3 years ago, desperate to achieve the life-long minimal "requirement" I'd set for myself to own my own home, I'd been mislead into moving into what turned out to be a very highly dangerous, crime-ridden, Meth-ravaged, entirely addict-inhabited, gang-riddled, ghetto neighborhood that during the day-time looked like older housing on a pretty tree-lined street. Nerdy, square, shy and NOT street-wise, I immediately stood out and people started targeting me. Petrified with fear, the level of bullying turned into criminal abuse, but not even the Sheriff's or Adult Protective Services would help me because they didn't believe I just could not escape this place alone.
So as soon as I'd raised such a fuss with the County, and went over everyone's heads to the Board of Supervisors, the personal assistant that was chosen for me helped me re-focus. Just that tiny bit of emotional support, and just the physical appearance of ONE visitor, was all it took me to "go for it" and start focusing better, concentrating harder, taking far better care of my own needs (sleep, eat, meds, breaks, naps, fluids, and some break from feeling imprisoned and under "lock down" just to stay alive in this place) and the changes/ improvements and recovery are happening so rapidly, I can hardly keep up with my own self.
To even greater stun me was that I soon realized that I still had "enough" cognitive capacity, and common sense to be thinking more clearly than my own Social Worker and using better judgement than either her or my "helper." My Social Worker was NOT HAPPY when I realized that my IHSS "helper" was a Meth-Addict herself and manipulating me, exploiting me, preying on her perception of me as too "out of it" to notice she was stealing from me and financially abusing me. I fired the "helper" after my Social Worker ignored my concerns for a week, then my Social Worker turned on ME for setting boundaries, and "quit" on me, prematurely closing my case.
After I was horrified by receiving an email from the same Social Worker mischaracterizing my symptoms and injuries as "character flaws," mistaking physiologically caused agitation for "an anger problem," and mistaking my effort to explain everything to her as "being too negative," I was done. I knew she felt too threatened and COULD NOT understand and did not CARE enough to even ask me a single question. So I corrected her and copied her Supervisor, providing detailed scientific research to explain what was really happening inside my head. I essentially said "You keep your misperceptions and I'll keep my sanity."
Meanwhile all of the local thugs who'd been targeting me, bullying me, cruelly teasing me for the uncontrollable body and hand tremors I have, were suddenly met with a DIFFERENT woman. Instead of hiding inside, curled into a ball of depression, despair, and pain, too terrified to even leave my home, are started walking with complete confidence and glaring them hard in the eye rather than pretending to ignore them. I was furious with how they'd cruelly abused me and kicked me while I was down, and they could tell by my body language that I was DONE with their sick antics at my expense. The bullying stopped, and others may come by looking for an opening to target me, but they never find one. I keep my pepper spray on me at all times. I'm ready.
BUT, I still was in for the SHOCK of my life at what happened next. After pining away for the family that abandoned me, and crying buckets of tears for years, feeling disposed of like a used, soiled tissue paper (after being treated like garbage by my own loved ones) I realized that I still loved them enough to write them to check on them. It HURT to find out that ALL OF MY FAMILY was literally disintegrating. Each had fallen into far harder, harsher circumstances, not so much physically threatened or unsafe, but the Father that disowned me had fallen prey to an evil Elder Abuse Scam exploiting a loophole in Florida laws, where "Professional Guardians for Profit" had already had him declared incompetent, appointed a "Guardian" that had complete control and possession of EVERYTHING he has (financial, real and personal property) and he's involuntarily institutionalized with zero rights, and not even allowed to open his own mail. The Sister and Brother that had abused me, were already financially set, so had each stopped even trying to work so they could drink and/or do drugs all the time. A mug shot of my sister showed her to be in such severely deteriorated physical and emotional condition. THEY were profoundly impacted by my injuries, could not deal or understand, felt helpless and devastated at losing me as they'd always known me to be, and had already been on the self-destructive road they're on now that's become a twisted trail of tragedy. The truth is that they've needed me more than I needed them, but our estrangement made mutual understanding impossible. Until now.
THEY do not understand me because they cannot. My Father's too helpless to even help himself now. My two siblings may never want or accept my help, and that's heartbreaking. NO MATTER WHAT, I REFUSE to treat them as they treated me, because I'd be an ingrate and if I failed to realize that no matter how bad my worst feels and is, at least my life is salvageable and safe because it is in my hands and except for financially, I've managed to do more than they could with much less of myself to work with.
They too were each very injured when I was injured, and their scars are as hidden and invisible to them as my injuries and cognitive deficits are to them. All I can do is the best I can with what I have to work with. Since I know too well the pain of being abandoned and treated like garbage, I just cannot allow myself to "quit" on them when they need me the most, even if they don't even want me. I've never had addiction issues so just my very existence in life is perceived by them to be a threat to their self-esteem, for they presume I'm somehow better than them. I know I'm not. My father abandoned the family when i was 6 and is still checked out, but I cannot pretend to understand him enough to judge him, and refuse to let him leave this earth feeling discarded, isolated and abandoned.
THOUGHTS: Maybe you may not be able to do all of the same things that you so easily did before. Comparing your "different Kaiten" to the previous Kaiten will stop when you realize that your biggest job is looking forward not backward, and staying as optimistic and upbeat as you can. The adage "Don't see the glass as half empty, rather see it as half full" applies, especially when you're so confused, frustrated, overwhelmed or (fill in the blank ). It's only natural to look back at times because YOU have lost you as you've always known yourself to be, and the loss of identity and relationships that come with that requires the same grieving process as death does. Denial, Anger, Bargaining, Depression and Acceptance. I feel that the way each of us experience the process is different, and it can require great patience and time. My thoughts about you is that if you even just keep doing as well as you already are, you'll never have to worry about being entirely capable of finding success, stability, self-reliance and ENOUGH of what you NEED, even if it's not exactly what you wanted or how you imagined it to be.
An INJURY can be as much or even more of an injury to your family, friends, co-workers, class-mates as it is to you. While you may feel helpless at times, you've been showing that you are not. Others who cannot see or touch your injuries, and therefore cannot be blamed for not understanding what they can't possibly understand without experiencing it themselves. Even if they think they understand Injury, each one is entirely unique. So the ability and capacity by others to understand you just isn't there, because even if they say they believe you and do, their senses tell them "She looks better so she IS better."
You never know how what happens to one of us can affect everyone around us in ways that may never be identified or even knowable to them or to you. Your loved ones also have to endure the greiving process of losing you as they always knew you to be, and that ain't easy because they may not even be able to understand much.
As for the work place bullies, they are cowards. If they weren't complete cowards they'd be incapable of mistreating you because they would not even have the ability to make themselves feel better at the expense of someone who outwardly appears to them to be someone who you are not, because they're not even aware of who you are. Yes, being shy feeds in to that and makes it harder. Each of us tend to find our own way of dealing with Bullies, so perhaps taking some Assertiveness training classes could benefit you. I've learned the hard way that it's a mistake (at least for me) to ever let anyone put me down because bullying is a form of abuse and abuse hurts. It can kill a tiny part of us inside our hearts if we accept it, so finding a way to give yourself a voice is, I think, very important. You can learn to manage your anger. For me, I recently responded to a Neighbor's (a Meth-Addict) abusive muttering the word "Bitch" about me just under her breath as she walked away like a pouting child. I'd simply maintained my BOUNDARIES exactly where they belonged and denied her effort to dump her life's or day's frustrations on me by not allowing her to make her problems my problems. SO, I called out to her: "Do you have something to say to my face?" Her partner than stepped in very respectfully and said "No. Nothing. We're just hot and tired." I replied "No human being is garbage, so calling me out of my name is not acceptable; I do undertand what it feels like to be hot and tired. Thank you for using good manners with me.
What can someone really say when you just say, in whatever words may come, "No. Don't dump yourself on me?" It's such a logical and reasonable statement, there's no basis to argue. If they try to, I'd personally just cut them off by walking away from them, rather than give them the power to hurt me or upset me. It's just so hard to do when you're shy, already feeling down, and someone comes up to kick you just for kicks. When I just say "There's no reason not to behave with basic human decency" it's teaching them how to treat me better, not being over-reactive or letting them take jabs at me. It works because you're also describing to them exactly what they already know they are doing, but are using words to make it see okay. It's not. I'd better go. I hope some of this is helpful to you. I'll leave you with a question to ask yourself: If you do not believe in yourself, how can you expect others to believe in you?"
It's when we doubt ourselves the most that we've got to set limits on others who would further injure us. Best wishes to you. Oh, one last thing: I had to stop my perfectionism and learn the words: "It's good ENOUGH." You're already doing the best you can do, so don't give others the power to add to your doubts, which are naturally there because you're still healing and recovering. It's a process that just takes time.