Claire Lacey
I thought I understood concussion. I had played contact sports my whole life, after all, complete with my fair share of bumps to the head. A few begrudging days of rest and I was always raring to get back to the game. Until the time that I wasn’t.
My last concussion four years ago was a life-altering event. In the weeks following that concussion, I was confused, disoriented, unable to read or write, cook a meal, or even walk properly. I had a severe and constant headache, and my room wouldn’t stop spinning. It was like the world’s worst hangover that just wouldn’t quit. The pain kept me from sleeping, my eyes couldn’t track properly, I had left side weakness, my emotions were all over the place, and even my menstrual cycle became erratic. As my rehabilitation stretched on and on, I realised I was no longer capable of performing my fun, frenetic job coaching at a gym, and my dreams of playing roller derby for Team Canada were over. I continue to cope with the effects that the concussion and its recovery process have had on my body and my ambitions.
The Invisible Gorilla by Christopher Chabris and Daniel Simons challenges many preconceptions about our certainties of the world. The subtitle, And Other Ways Our Intuitions Deceive Us, describes what the book is all about: how we can be lured into a false sense of believing ourselves correct in many aspects of our lives. The authors describe the fragility of memory; how recall seems to us like an unedited video, but is instead a continuously updated and altered process with errors added all the time. We should never be certain of past events unless there is robust corroboration. Professors admanant they knew exactly where they were when the Twin Towers were attacked were mistaken. Eye-witness testimonies taken very soon after events can differ remarkably. The examples go on.
I nearly give up. Twice. The first time I am sitting by the window at home, hand over my ear which still has a strange thudding lack of unlocated feeling that the doctor couldn’t find with her little hammer light thing and I can’t find the words for. Dull? Numb? Dumb. I feel so dumb. Stupid, stupid me.
A year almost to the day from 
Day One.