October 24, 2014

Hi everybody. Man, I'm having a bad day today. You know, you have ups and downs. Today I feel really irritated, but we won't go into it.

The cool thing I did was I went up to Rochester NY to see my coach. It was my 35th anniversary of my run across America. That, and my coach was being inducted into the RIT Hall of Fame. It was a great day. But I drove 7 hours to get up there, then, well, met my teammates at a place, how can I say, that was not the best place for me. You see, there's 5 things that will trigger a seizure for me: low light with high lights, lots of noise, busy patterns, and stress. So what did my friends do? They brought me to a bar. But, you know what? I dealt with it pretty good. No seizure. My friend here said, "You're cured!" I wish. I spent the next day at the induction of my coach and then drove 7 hours back. Actually, I didn't drive. My mom drove. The whole thing's kind of ironic because about a month before, the doctors cut my coaches leg off due to an infection. Imagine, a runner with just one leg. He took it all in good stride (no pun intended). Actually, he looks better because his complexion looks better. It probably saved his life having the amputation.

You know, I mentioned that my mom drove me up there. She's been a great help. You know, one reason why I'm getting better faster is becuas of my mother. I think when you are like this, you know, traumatic brain injury, you really need a wing-man like my mother. Your really need someone to help you out. I guess it could apply to any serious illness, but you definitely need an advocate to help you. Otherwise, game over, as my doctor would say. My doctor said to me if all this happened in my 70's, it would be game over. Lucky me, my friend says, and I agree. See all this takes time. You'll get out of it what you put into it. You can't just sit around. Believe me. I guess that's why I'm irritated today, because I haven't really been working. I've been recovering from my mini trip. It's either that or my reaction to try to build a fire. I almost became the fire.

I'm gonna leave it at that and include some photos I've been doing. Hope you guys all have a good week and remember how lucky you are.

P.S. Here's a link to my blog about the past.

October 17, 2014

Fits of rage. Now that I've got your attention, my medicine said that one of the side effects is "Fits of Rage." Well, after a few fits of rage I decided maybe I should switch medicine. At least I think it was the medicine. Anyway, I'm off the medicine that causes the fits of rage and I'm on some other stuff. It's better. The other thing I did was I put all my strenuous workouts in the morning. It seems to prevent small seizures. I do anything like the bike workout or weight strength building through weights in the morning. It seems to help a a lot. Then I do stuff like painting in the afternoon. Remember, I work out from sunrise to sunset. When you're like this, it's like going to work, you know. Life becomes therapy. My friend here said, "It's a good thing the days are getting shorter," and I agreed!

The other thing I've been doing is working on my photography book. I've been working on images from my trip coast to coast. I could only stare at the computer for about 2 hours. It seems the computer seems to trigger a small seizure. I guess it might be the flickering of the screen. I don't know. Above I mentioned small seizures. Mini seizures. I call them moments and you know, I tend to try and meditate when they come on. I always think about surfing. Something else might work for you. Religion, friendship, a dog, another sport. I don't know, but I prefer thinking about something than medication. It's weird but I think about one specific wave I caught in the fall. I re-play the ride of my life, over and over. It was a great ride. It was a wave from a hurricane swell. Hard to describe unless you're a surfer but it was unreal, like riding a mountain.

Anyway, I'm gonna end it here. You can visit my other blog where I talk about the past. My friend here will include the link. Have a good week. Oh yeah, here are some current pictures I've been doing.

Love, B. Nice

October 10, 2014

Hi everybody. You know, I want to say thank you to my friend who's sitting in front of me because there's no way I could do this myself. She's typing for me. I mean I'm messed up. I can hardly hold a towel. But I am improving. There's no doubt, but it is slow, I'll tell you. I set a goal to be walking by 2016. You see, that's when I'm going to take a trans-Atlantic ship to London. LIke I said before, it's good to set goals. I've been having a therapist, a physical therapist come once a week. I get on the floor and stretch out. We practice things like sitting up and learning how to crawl. Believe me, it's tough. You know, I'm used to doing things like marathons and surfing big waves. You know, stuff like that. But that's nothing compared to this physical therapy. You gotta really tough it out. It's not easy but the reward is worth it. You gotta just keep working hard. Remember, it's your job. I've been doing things more like water therapy. It's so important, although my mother scares the shit out of me. When I go underwater I can just hear her laughing. Its a bit unnerving but it's all worth it. You know what's a drag, I've been having more and more mini-what I call moments. I guess they're mini seizures. I seem to have them at the end of the day when I'm tired. I've mention before that I'm on anti seizure medicine so it seems to work. It keeps the mini moments from turning into a big seizure. I wanted to mention something. It's kind of a flashback. I remember I had what I would call an out of body experience. I was standing behind the ambulance watching myself get loaded in. Then I saw my mother over me in the back of the ambulance and the driver of the ambulance shutting the door. Then it ended. It was bizarre. There was no feeling. No emotion. It was just an observation. That got me thinking. Did I really have an out of body experience? or is my imagination really good coupled with lack of oxygen to the brain. I don't know, but I know that having my mother hold my hand brought me back to my body, so it's good to have someone there holding your hand. That is, if you want to come back. Just thought I'd mention that. Anyway, I'm gonna keep it short this week because my little one is gonna be here tonight and I gotta stay rested. When I do these blogs it really tires me out. It'll be great to see her. Have a good week. Love, B. Nice

Oh yeah! I'll include some new photos I've been doing. My friend here said, "Nude photos?!" and I said no NEW photos. Believe me, you wouldn't want to see me nude any time soon.

October 3, 2014

Hi everybody. Welcome to the blog about the present and I'm presently sitting here with my friend on a beautiful fall day. We're outside. The leaves are starting to turn, it's really beautiful, but my dog has the most outrageous gas. Thank God it's windy.

You know, the other day a friend of mine said to me, "Oh, captain demando, you are." I said, "Whaaat?" Apparently I'm very demanding. Well, you know what, maybe I am, but if you couldn't feed yourself or walk, you'd be demanding too. I try to feed myself, but I end up stabbing myself in the lip. And when I'm brushing my teeth, I'm brushing my eyeball. So, you see, I am a little demanding when I ask people to do things for me. I can't do anything but talk and I couldn't even do that a little while ago.

This week actually was yesterday, I went to get into the therapy center at Burke. I wanted to try out some other bikes. It was just me and one other guy. The head person there said, "We have a few volunteers that will help you." All of a sudden about ten 24 year old girls walked over. You know, I think I had a dream like this. Back to reality. They helped me get on a recumbent trike. It's very low to the ground and a three wheel bike. It's a hand pedal bike. Anyway, I forgot to mention I can stand up and get on the bike, but before I could speak, ten women picked me up and started to carry me towards the bike. I was about to say something, but then I thought I'd just give in. It was kind of crazy cause it took about ten minutes to get me on the bike. I said, "Wait a minute, wait a minute. Do you guys come with the bike if I buy it?" Well, they nervously laughed and put me on the bike. They strapped me in everywhere. I felt like a freaking christmas tree because I had so much bracing on me. My hands were strapped to the handles. My chest was strapped to the back. My feet were strapped in. You got the idea. It was a bit too much. I appreciated their help, but give me a break. The cycling went well. I just took a few laps around their track. I invited them all out for drinks but they all walked away.

The other thing I've been doing, I've been going back to water therapy a lot. It's really great because as I mentioned before, you can walk in water by yourself. It's fun, a little exhausting but it feels great to actually walk.

I wanted to mention before that I wanted to dedicate this to my friend who passed away. She was really cool. Like a sister to me. Anyway, I didn't go to the funeral because any kind of stress could cause a seizure. I didn't want to take a chance of having a seizure at her funeral. I mean even the morning news sets off mini seizures. Now it's a fine line between medicine that works and keeps you active and medicine that works and turns you into a drooling piece of meat. Just an observation there. Anyway, I'm gonna leave it at that. I'll include some photos from my current work.

Oh yeah, to go back to the homepage, go to www.briannice.com.

Talk to you all next week. Love, B. Nice

September 26, 2014

Hi you guys. Welcome to the blog where I talk about the present. You know, the here and now.

You know, a lot of people say I'm a worry wart, but I have a lot to worry about. I mean give me a break. You should see what I saw. For one thing, if you saw what I saw you would turn off your phone and put it away before you drive. There were a lot of people with injuries from the phone in the car. That's why I'm a worry wart.

Frustration. That's a word for this week. Frustration. I'll tell  you, when you're at this point all you want to do is get up and walk across the room and read a paper. But if I tried to do that, I'd look like a character out of Monty Python doing a silly walk. I guess I just have to be patient, but I'll tell you frustration is really kicking in. I'm getting better, no doubt, but it's very very slow. Hey! Did you know we only use about 10% of our brain? Just a fact I'll throw out there. You know my friend here was reading past blogs to me and it must have triggered a dream I had the other night. You know, the blog where I talked about the bartender in Mexico. It made me think of a drink to make: 8 oz. of tomato juice. 4 oz. of beer. 1 shake of tabasco sauce. 1 shake of bitters. 1 oz. of really good silver tequila (you know, top shelf stuff). 1/2 oz. of cointreu or grand marnier. 1/2 oz. of real fresh lime juice. 1/2 oz. of sugar cane syrup. And mix it all up over ice and then strain into a glass of ice, a glass that's rimmed with salt. Throw in a lime and a fresh celery stick and Voila! You have a bloody Marguerita. Too bad I don't drink anymore.

I have lots of dreams. They seem to come to me, you know, the creative dreams, they seem to come to me around 4 am. It's been fun making these dreams come true. Like, I have dreams about painting and photography. I think I mentioned this before. Dreaming. Hey, I got nothing better to do.

I live with my parents just north of New York City. We live on the Hudson River. It's been an amazing summer. I spent a lot of time outside, in my wheelchair, just looking at things like a tree or a glass of water. It's been a very Zen experience. Just opposite to what my life was like. Maybe it's all part of the healing process. The weather's been great. I'll include some photos I've been taking. Some new stuff. Hope you have a good week. Love, B. Nice