Neuropsychological Testing: Trickling Toward New Beginnings

Neuropsychologists are not medical physicians; they are psychologists who study the relationship between behavior and the brain. They first interview the individual: work and medical history, family dynamics, and school performance. The neuropsychologist gathers this information in order to compare level of functioning prior to a traumatic brain injury with post-injury functioning. The testing covers a broad range of areas: concentration, attention span, basic and abstract thinking, memory, mathematical reasoning, motor skills, problem-solving skills, judgment, and emotional character.

In May 2006, when I believed there had to be more than PTSD to blame for my difficulties in the workplace, I saw a neuropsychologist. I spent eight hours filling out self-evaluation forms and undergoing testing. Separately, my husband and I scored (one being the best, ten the worst) my level of irritability and depression, and my ability to remember things, concentrate, multitask, recall words, and think quickly. Our scores were nearly identical, with most of them ranging between five and eight. I spent the remainder of the day filling in dots on questionnaires, naming faces in photos, sticking pegs in tiny holes in less than fifty seconds, drawing figures from memory, naming as many items as I could think of that started with the letter T in less than one minute.

A few weeks later, the results came in the mail: the tests suggested I had sustained a traumatic brain injury when I was hit by a car three years earlier.

Finally, I had answers as to why I had trouble following conversations, learning new information, or performing most tasks in a timely manner. Finally, I had a reason as to why I could not retrieve the word from my brain when the neuropsychologist asked me to name the photo of two vertically connected glass bulbs with sand trickling from the top bulb to the bottom bulb.

Hourglass.

Emblematic of the passage of time, the hourglass also marks new beginnings.