“I’m tired of explaining myself.”
Not just once in a while. All the time.
Explaining why you are tired or why you forgot. Explaining why you need to leave early, cancel plans, write everything down, or sit in the car for five minutes before you go inside because your brain just needs a minute.
Explaining that just because you look fine does not mean you feel fine.
Explaining that brain injury is not something you “get over” just because time has passed.
After a while, it gets exhausting.
So sometimes you stop explaining.
You smile. You say, “I’m okay.” You change the subject. You laugh it off.
Meanwhile, inside, you are thinking: No, really. I am trying so hard.
For many survivors and caregivers, that is one of the loneliest parts of brain injury.
People mean well. They really do.
But when you say you are overwhelmed and someone tells you to “just make a list”… when you say you are tired and someone says, “Well, everybody gets tired”… when you forget something important and someone laughs and says, “Welcome to getting older!”…
It can make you feel like you are speaking a language no one else understands.
Like maybe you are asking for too much.
Like maybe you should just try harder.
Like maybe you are the only one.
You are not.
Imagine this instead:
You are talking with your peer mentor for the first time.
You start to say, “I know this probably sounds silly, but sometimes I walk into a room and…”
And before you can even finish, they laugh and say:
“…forget why you went in there? Yep. Been there.”
You say, “Sometimes I am so tired after going to the grocery store that I need to lie down for two hours.”
And they say: “Oh, absolutely. The grocery store is somehow a marathon, a scavenger hunt, and a sensory obstacle course all rolled into one.”
You say, “I just miss who I used to be.”
And instead of trying to fix it, or cheer you up, or tell you to “stay positive,” they quietly say:
“Me too.”
There is something powerful about that moment.
Not because they have the perfect answer.
Not because they can magically make everything easier.
But because, for the first time in a long time, you do not have to explain every single thing.
You do not have to start at the beginning. You do not have to convince someone that what you are feeling is real. You do not have to spend half your energy trying to make other people understand.
They already get it.
A peer mentor is not there to fix you.
They are there to remind you that you are not broken.
That there is nothing wrong with you for struggling with something hard.
That you are not lazy, dramatic, weak, or “just not trying hard enough.”
You are living with a brain injury. Or loving someone who is.
That is hard. Of course it is hard.
And sometimes the most healing thing is not advice.
Sometimes it is simply hearing another person say: “I understand.”
For some people, peer mentorship means swapping little survival tricks – the phone reminder that actually works, the snack you keep in the car, the one thing that makes the grocery store slightly less terrible.
For others, it means having someone to text on a bad day.
Someone who will not judge you if you say, “Today was awful.”
Someone who understands that canceling plans is not being flaky. That crying in the Target parking lot happens. That brain injury is messy and frustrating and exhausting and sometimes, honestly, kind of weird.
Like finding your phone in the refrigerator.
Or putting the milk in the pantry.
Or searching for your glasses for twenty minutes while they are on your head.
Your peer mentor may not have your exact story.
But they have enough of their own to know that you should not have to do this alone.
At the Brain Injury Association of Nebraska, our Peer Mentorship Program connects survivors and caregivers with trained mentors who understand because they have lived it, too.
You do not have to know exactly what to say. You just have to show up.
The Brain Injury Association of Nebraska not only offers information and referral, but case management to find the resources and make positive changes to live a more fulfilling future with better coping strategies as well as memory aids on board. If you or someone you know has lasting effects from a brain injury, please contact us and allow us to offer our services, to find a new normal on this journey where ‘once you’ve seen a brain injury, you’ve seen one brain injury.
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