Silvie V. Transcript

I am Silvie. I am 30 years old, and I live in the Netherlands. And in May 2017, I sustained my concussion and whiplash. I was driving home on my scooter, and I bumped into another scooter, and I fell to the floor and I didn’t hit my head. So, at that moment, I thought I was really lucky. I only hurt of my ankle, and I was able to go home.

And the next day I felt a little bit weird, but I went to work anyway. And I didn’t know what was going on because I didn’t fall on my head, so I thought it was only my ankle, and I know my neck was hurting. So, I thought I just stretched my muscles, and that’s it. And I went to work for the next three days as well. But at work, I couldn’t concentrate. I made a lot of mistakes. My eyes were hurting for my computer, and I felt upset. I felt confused. I just didn’t know what was happening. I felt something was wrong, but I didn’t know what was going on with me, and I couldn’t address what it exactly was.

So, on Friday, I went home early and I told my employer that I wasn’t feeling great, and that I would rest the whole weekend. And that I would be back on Monday. And then on the same day, on Friday, I went to my own doctor, and I told him the whole story. And he told me that I was feeling restless that could be from the accident and he gave me some relaxing medication. So, I went home and I thought okay, everything would be alright and those medicines, they were relaxing. And I slept for almost two days and my symptoms– they became worse– and yeah, Monday I wasn’t able to go back to work, and I told my boss again that needed an extra week. And I really hoped that I would feel better after a week of rest.

But I remember that on Friday, I had a birthday planned, and my flatmates and I were going to a birthday party. And I just broke out in tears before we were heading off. And my flatmates told me that I should just take some rest and that everything would be okay. And yeah, of course I believe it in that moment, and I went to bed and I slept for hours. And the week after that I wasn’t able to do anything– even those normal daily activities like doing groceries, cooking, reading, cleaning–every normal task was just too much for me. My head couldn’t handle it. I felt really emotional and I just didn’t even know why. I had to cry all the time.

And I remember the extra week off ended up becoming a month and the month then turned into a half a year and a half a year or less and then became a year… and after a year I have never gone back to the office again. I love my job. I love the people there. And I’m always really ambitious and I felt so useless doing nothing at home and yeah, during the first year I didn’t know what was going on with me. There was no doctor who ever told me that it could be a concussion. And I felt guilty all the time that I couldn’t explain my situation to anyone. I couldn’t explain it in my work, to my co-workers, my friends, my family, and even myself.

So many times I tried to act like nothing was going on. And yeah, it felt so weird because from the inside, I felt like everything was wrong and I had a really hard time sleeping. I couldn’t concentrate. I felt overwhelmed all the time. I cried a lot. Not knowing why I felt so tired. I got a pressure on my head like there was this elastic band around my head all the time. And I couldn’t read. I couldn’t watch any screens. I was really sensitive to sounds and to lights. I had a shortness of breath. I had a pressure on my chest just out of nowhere. I felt really restless. And yeah, during that time, I was home most of the time alone. I couldn’t manage to see a lot of people. It was just too much. Yeah, I feel really overwhelmed by everything in a short period of time.

And yeah, I wasn’t able to go outside a house because I couldn’t drive a car. I couldn’t use the public transport. I couldn’t ride my bike because in Amsterdam, it’s so busy and there are so many impressions by riding on your bike and yeah, it’s really hard to manage to just go outside in Amsterdam because it can be so busy. And yeah that’s why here it was a really hard time and especially because I didn’t know what was going on with me, and I often wondered if I was going to recover. I asked this question almost every day to myself, if I would get better or how and how long it would take, and I just didn’t know how to get those answers and even my doctors didn’t know the answer. So it was really hard for me to find out what I needed in my recovery. And I felt really misunderstood by most doctors as well because I remember the last time when I went to my doctor–I think I’ve been there for six times– and the last time my doctor told me that I had some burnout symptoms or an anxiety disorder and he didn’t want to refer me to a neurologist or something like that, but he only wants to refer me to a psychologist and it felt like all those symptoms were just in my head, but I know my body and I knew it wasn’t like this. And I knew that without my symptoms, I wouldn’t have those triggers at all. So it freaked me really out because I couldn’t get the help from my doctor.

So I felt very lost. And yeah, no one could tell me what I needed to do in order to recover and I just didn’t know what to do. Did I need to risk that too? Should I do some activity? Should I exercise or would exercise make it even worse? I felt really lost not knowing what to do and the thing that no one else would tell me that was the hardest thing ever. And yeah I– After almost a year being someone different than before your accident– It was also really hard emotionally.

And I’ve always been a busy person with lots of parties. I went to the gym almost four times a week. I worked five days sometimes six days a week and a really busy social life. And I was always busy always doing something. And I Yeah, it was really easy for me, and after that day of my accident, my life change for 180 degrees. And all those things disappeared. And yeah, the hardest part was not having my normal life, and not knowing if I would be able to get it back and how to get this back.

And there were some days that I felt a bit better. But yeah, always followed by those setbacks and in the beginning those setbacks were there for sometimes for weeks, and it did improve over time and my setbacks aren’t there for weeks anymore, but still, I still have them and, yeah, it’s really hard to tell to people who don’t know you that you don’t feel great after a year of recovery. Yeah, it’s so hard to explain to others. And yeah, that resulted that I try to act as normal and also that part was breaking me up after, yeah, after a year. And I really tried to start some treatments after the first year because in the first year I believed that I just needed to rest and yeah, I believe that because my doctor told me to. So, I rested for almost a year.

And of course I tried to go back to work, but it didn’t work out because it was just too much to handle. And I tried to push myself to go back but yeah, it wasn’t just working and after that year, I thought okay, I’m resting for almost a year. When–yeah– what benefits enough? When did I rest enough? And I didn’t believe anymore, that rest would be the solution to everything. So I started looking for treatments after, yeah, after that year and I tried many things. I tried acupuncture. I tried cranial sacral therapy, I went to a physiotherapist. I went to a lot of doctors. I tried many things: Neurofeedback. Yeah way more things, and I will tell you more about all those treatments in another episode. But most of them, they didn’t work, and I felt really disappointed. Every time I tried something new and it didn’t work again. So the emotional part was so hard and it’s still really hard. Overtime it gets easier and better, and I improve slowly over time.

And yeah, most important is that I learned more from people in a community like-minded people who are who have been in the same situation then from my own doctor, and I really hope that will change one day that I would be more awareness about these subjects and that’s something I really missed in my journey.

After two years, I started thinking: what am I missing in my journey? And it was the help from professionals, but also from like-minded people who really know what it is like to live with those symptoms.