The human brain can be fascinating. Odd, but a fascinating thing that many people don’t know much about. A lot goes on up there. Sometimes, it can be louder than one’s voice. You wonder a lot, you think a lot, and you remember a lot. When was the last time you truly knew who you were? Or what you wanted to be? Personally, I changed that a lot, especially as I grew up. Little me would probably tell you I would want to work with animals because they’re adorable and honestly, you can resist them. Knowing they’re not doing well and I could do something about it made me feel a certain way. Now that I think about it truly, it must’ve been the empath in me. Little me would feel bad even if I left one of my stuffed animals away from the rest of the crowd. Inanimate things don’t really have feelings, but how do you explain that to a small child? They’re just hitting the preoptional stage. 

Don’t get me wrong, I love animals. I would care for them more than I would do for myself. But, you can’t truly understand what goes on inside as you would a human. The first time I realized  that there deeper levels to understanding humans had been the moment I realized that life wasn’t just about a few bumps in the road, a small papercut that could be bandaged up and healed within the next 24 hours. Waking up in the middle of the night, blinded by the lights shining through the blind, and someone whispering in your ear “to go back to bed, we’ll be back soon.” What the hell was that about? Only hours after I had woken up, groggy from being woken up all of a sudden in the middle of the night had I finally been made aware that my mom had been taken into surgery. To me, I hadn’t really understood what that meant to a full extent. Had it been a worse version of a papercut? Maybe she’d gotten injured and they’d place a bandage as she had done days prior when I had fallen off my bike. It really hurt, but not as much as when she had returned home. She hadn’t been the same. She hasn’t been since then. Physically, at least. 

These haven’t been defining moments for me, though. Or, also known as the “fork in the road.” I’m not entirely sure what that would be. It could be that it had been sometime around the end of Sophomore year.. A hit to the head is a serious issue. And in old fashion me style, I toughened it out (cried for most of the night, actually) because the moment that my mom had mentioned taking me to hospital, my head had felt “better.” For months after that silly incident, I joked about it. The same way I now joke about the fact that I have seen the neurologist more than I had gone to my third period this year. It’s a total exaggeration, but not something an outsider would understand unless you were within the folds of my brain.  I make jokes about a lot of things. I often think that it must be that I want those around me to smile, even on the days that they don’t feel like it. It brings joy to myself to know that people are able to laugh. Though it makes my head hurt to laugh sometimes. It hurts even worse when I think too hard, even now. 

I like to think that throughout life I have been different versions of myself. Each year, it’s something new. For example, I used to think that the classes I took in high school would help lead me to something bigger. Nothing was interesting at first, except for English. I liked writing, but I’m not the kind of person who can easily incorporate the thoughts in my head into words.  Science was a close competitor, but it wasn’t the kind of science that I was really that interested in. The brain had always been the thing that most stuck out to me. Why? I wouldn’t know until I experienced a trauma myself. 

What I felt was confusing, No one knew the answer besides it being something that doctors hadn’t experienced before. Being “rare” wasn’t the sort of label I was looking for. Answers were all that I wanted, not a label. Not knowing what is wrong with you or what it is that you feel is not a pleasant feeling at all. Like people before me– my mom and brother showed me that pain came in all unexpected forms. 

It wasn’t until recently that I finally had gotten the chance to know the reason behind everything that was going on inside the brain, literally. I was told MRIs were scary, even breathing felt difficult, but it had been the opposite for me. If I could do it again, I would. Although the results have finally eased me to an extent, I still do have to live with the fact that chronic pain is now a part of my life. Before this, I had been dealing with other sorts of stuff. In all honesty, no one person should suffer with anything, much less feel like they aren’t valuable people. 

At the end of the day, I tell myself that even though days can be tough and I no longer feel like I can achieve the things I once wanted so bad, I know there are people out there who in the future will be counting on someone’s expertise and valuable knowledge in order to feel at ease like I did. At no point in my life had I even considered wanting to seek something within Psychology or Neuroscience, but knowing that later down the future I may be able to resonate with a child who is scared, confused, and not know what to make of themselves due to a force stopping them does keep me going, Like Phoebe Bridgers once said, “Never goes away, but it all works out.”