Almost four weeks ago I got a concussion. It was a really lame way of getting a concussion as it happened in my sleep. What I thought would be just a minor bruise, turned into a three to four week issue that prevented me from getting work done and focusing. One can never really understand the severity of a concussion until one gets one. I never knew what a big deal getting a concussion is rather than just getting a head bruise. Even when you start to feel better, you truly aren’t recovered. I would go days with a lingering headache. It tended to depend on how much rest and sleep I got the day before. If I went to three of my classes in a day I would be totally brain dead after and would not be able to do any work. Some people would think this a normal thing, but if you have ever gotten a concussion you would know that it is not normal to be a full foggy state and have blurry vision after just a few minutes of looking at your computer or trying to take notes in class. Many people in my grade in college had gotten a concussion in the few weeks or so, and as a result we bonded on the fact that we couldn’t go out at night or do homework. Some people also may think that not having to do homework is a good thing but in reality it just hurts you and causes you to be much more stressed out than you already are. It is so stressful to have to catch up on all the work that you missed and keep up with the current work. My professors were very understanding and that is the important part. I knew someone in my high school that got a concussion so badly that she was unable to go to class for 6 weeks and than had to take it really slowly to get back into the swing of things, and as a result she had to continue being schooled through the summer and took her finals almost two months later. Luckily for me, my concussion wasn’t nearly as bad, but I still probably should have taken off a few more days than I did.
The most important thing I wanted to touch on was the fact that being concussed and taking classes like digital media and computer science do not go well together at all. It is almost ironic because the first thing the doctor tells you when you get a concussion is to not look at a screen for almost a week or so. You have to be bored as you recover. Being in a digital media class and computer science class, when all you work is online, does not help the situation. It was so hard for me to recover fast because everything is on my phone and computer. I realized through this concussion that I am on my phone and am addicted to my phone way too much. I went maybe a day without looking at my phone, which probably caused my recovery time to increase unnecessarily. I never thought that looking at a screen would actually cause you to get headaches faster when concussed, but after sitting through a digital media class or working on a comp sci lab my brain would be absolutely fried. I would leave class all blurry, probably not remember anything that I had just learned, and have a headache. Basically I just did not feel right as most of the time I felt like I was in a fog. A lot of the time I would second guess myself and consider that this might just be because of lack of sleep or maybe just looking at a screen too much, or a long day of class, but as I start to fully recover I can tell that there was definitely something wrong with me at some point and that I most definitely did suffer from a concussion.
After getting a concussion, I am much more careful of my surrounding and I focus on trying to keep my head safe. People tend not to realize how important it is to keep our heads from bumping into other things, but in reality it is a huge deal and can lead to some chronic issues. The next step for me is to make sure that there are no post concussion symptoms and in a few weeks. There should not be if I continue to rest and take it easy.