One, Two, Three, Four Stricks and You're Out

I had four doctors trying to fix my problem, which ended up being a case of, “Too many blind cooks in the kitchen.”
The first three doctors read from the same script or recipe, “I can’t find anything physically wrong with you. It must be a psychologically induced problem. You will need to get over it and move on with your life.”
One doctor implied he knew the missing ingredient was physical in origin – a brain injury. Only this information came three years too late, the damage had become permanent. The uphill battle for recovery was no less heroic in nature than climbing Mount Everest. Climbing a mountain or walking the path of recovery, both are a choice that will require everything you can give it.
It was a relief to find out that my chronic symptoms were not a figment of my imagination, but were a by-product of a real injury. This was my first step on my path to finding what would be my new “normal.” Because of the delay in addressing these problems, they became permanent, chronic and impossible to reverse. Today, more than thirty years later, they still are a constant reminder preventing me from not thinking about them – my new normal.