We are sticking with the element theme.  For now…  In 116 posts, I am going to have to figure out what to do because I will be out of elements and we all know I have more than 116 things to talk about.  But also – I don’t know all of the elements and while it will be fun for a while, I am not going to be able to relate flerovium to neurological rehab.  I don’t even know what flerovium is.

This post’s element is Hydrogen.  Atomic number 1,  atomic mass 1.00784 u. Lightest element, highly combustible.

In a person’s body, it keeps your cells and joints hydrated.  It allows for the removal of waste and toxins.  It works as an antioxidant, reducing inflammation in your brain.  It is required for the neurotransmitter dopamine, that helps to produce the happiness/reward feeling in the things we do or enjoy.

What we really know, though, in general as humans, is that it joins with oxygen to create water.  H2O. It covers the earth, it makes our bodies, it is the reason we all have overpriced water vessels that can keep our water-based drinks cold for 62.5 hours*!

I have always been a bit of a fish – I love to swim, be in or around water.  As an adult, I enjoy kayaking when it is possible.  As a child, my favorite memories were of going to the YMCA, special trips to the lake or a beach.  It could be that my body needed the input that water provided,  my mind needed the think space that only swimming  could provide, or that my heart and lungs needed the rhythm to keep me steady.

In my last post, I likened oxygen to the people and things that brought me to life.  Hydrogen, on the other hand, can provide great benefit but also immense trouble.  It can flow with the other things that bring meaning and joy, or it can be a literal bomb.

I want the hydrogen in my life to be a part of water- wrapped with the things I love and breathe in, a place for me to exercise my mind and body.

But sometimes it is not.  Sometimes the hydrogen is alone and unstable.  When this is the case, things go the wrong way.  Whether on land or in a pool or toes deep in the ocean, it creates waves.  It moves you.  It takes from you. It pulls you under.

This is what my patients and their families are going through.

There may be deficits or difficulties that are slow and steady and reveal themselves as the child goes through school.  Academics can produce so much pressure at such an early age for kids that by the time you realize something is wrong, they have produced all of the coping strategies to keep from feeling like they aren’t smart enough.

More adults are being diagnosed with different forms of  neurodivergence, leading them to seek assistance after an entire childhood and adolescence with only their own coping mechanisms to support them.

Then there are difficulties unknown – some biological mechanism wreaks havoc on a brain and they have to relearn how to think, talk, move.  Sometimes these things are episodic.  Some are chronic.  Some are fatal.

Finally you have the situations where timing plays a part in a drastic change – a car accident, a fall, a knock to the head that leads to hospitalization and again, relearning all of the skills appropriate for life.

These are the hydrogen bombs.  They hit families hard, radiate out, and strain every aspect of being from their unit.

My job in their lives is to be the calm waters they come to.

Still a component of hydrogen, but a stable one that can take them in, clean them up, and help them heal.  Don’t get it twisted – I am FAR from the second coming; but I am a person who has epic amounts of understanding and compassion and a sense of duty to help where I can.

I have said it before and I will continue to say it time and time again- I learned from Lynne Drazinski, legendary rehab SLP and all-around great human, to look at what we, as professionals in neurological rehab care,  get to do.  It is an honor and a privilege to be a part of my patients’ care.  Every child, adolescent, or adult that I have treated has helped shape me into a better version of me.

I would love to take credit for their successes, but in reality, I was just the water.  They were the ones who got in, worked out, and made it to the other end of the pool.

*62.5 hours is a rough estimate of an imaginary water vessel that I have created in my mind.