Well this is likely the end of my life, something truly tragic has happened. Was walking down the street, bent down to throw something in the trash, lifted my body back up and smashed my head under a street sign. It made a huge sound and a woman passing by even said a loud ‘oof’ Which basically confirms the severity of the impact. My head bounced off towards the ground.
here is a video I took of the street sign in question
Fml - YouTube

For those who don’t know I already have bad pcs from a lifetime of contact sports

Did you get a cut on your head from the thin metal sign edge???

Thank you very much for the response. I did not get a cut because I was wearing a thin cap made of rain jacket type fabric although maybe if I was not wearing it I would have gotten cut. I definitely may have a bit of a sore line across the top of my head where the impact occurred

Made a post yesterday about smashing my head which you can find in my history

Went to the er last night, doctor said she thought it would be ok but might make my post concussion syndrome temporarily worse which I think I’m experiencing as well as soreness on the top of my head where it hit. She said to take a few days off. So I guess overall it might be ok but I’m not sure, this is literally my biggest nightmare come true since I have serious health anxiety regarding brain trauma

This is a really rough and devastating time in my life, all may be lost but I’m doing everything I can to hold on to a little bit of hope and not let myself become entirely consumed by the darkness. It’s rough, I have no idea how life will keep going or how I’ll ever be able to move forward so all I can really do is take things minute by minute

Hey Ben, sorry to hear about this incident. It must be very upsetting.

However, I think it's crucial to recognize the type of cognitive distortions that you might be making.

When you say "This is likely the end of my life", I hear very clear catastrophizing.

I think we have had similar experiences in regards to incredible amounts of stress and anxiety that have accompanied our recoveries.

I absolutely understand how bad and scary the darkness can be. I have had a number of setbacks and aggravations and am currently dealing with very bad chronic pain to go along with the stress.

I have made psychological strengthening my number one priority - and although it is not at all easy - I've been making a lot of progress.

For me the key things that have helped my mind so far have been:
- OCD specific therapy - CBT/exposure response prevention
- SSRI medication
- mindfulness and meditation
- the ketogenic diet has been great for me personally along with good nutritional supplements
- exercise/strength training

It's gotten to the point where now it's the chronic pain that is the biggest thing to get over. I haven't completely overcome the mental stuff, but I'm in such a better place, even though dealing with chronic pain is incredibly stressful and taxing in and of itself.

I don't know if this will help you, but for me it became clear that the only way to get better and get out of chronic pain would be to get over all the avoidance behaviours, mental checking/worrying, catastrophizing etc.

I decided that since all the stress/anxiety is ironically stopping me from getting better, I have to cultivate the attitude of "it's not worth trying to protect myself anymore because trying to protect myself is actually hurting myself. I have to risk whatever will happen and get back to moving and thinking as naturally as possible."

Of course, just saying that doesn't make it easy. But through the methods above that I listed, (especially the combination of exposure response prevention and medication) it is happening for me.

I had a person on the street come barreling into me from behind the other day, causing a whiplash like motion (my chronic pain is in my upper back, neck and head). In the past, this would have led to non-stop catastrophizing and worry which would lead to avoidance behaviors which would exacerbate the PTSD issues like muscle clenching and guarding, which in turn are probably big contributing factors to the chronic pain.

It's really not an easy mindset to cultivate, especially when you have an anxiety disorder, but making the decision that I am going to optimize for health in terms of diet, nutrition, exercise and thinking and then that I will risk whatever I have to risk in order to move and think more naturally, has been key for me.

Thank you very much for your response. Your advice is extremely helpful and I am wishing you all the best

Do you think it’s possible that this recent incident was just a setback and not a new life changing injury or does the severity of it imply it is definitely damaging?

I think that it is not only possible, but probable that this incident was just a setback.

It is really important however to realize that by asking for reassurance, you are giving fuel to the OCD.

There are some really good truths about the path to overcome OCD and some really difficult ones.

The good is that it is completely beatable. I'm having great success using the most evidence based therapy, which is exposure response prevention.

The difficult is that, well, it is difficult. You have to expose yourself to scary things (either on purpose, or through unplanned exposures like when you hit the stop sign) but then not do the compulsive behaviors (like mental checking as to how hard you hit it or asking others if they think it's ok).

I know how hard it is to do and I know how emotionally salient and how powerful the anxiety is that makes it very hard to not to the compulsive behaviors.

We have to recognize the anxiety as OCD and allow the anxiety to be there until it goes away on it's own. Yes, it's painful. Yes, it works.

Let me know if you'd like to chat on the phone or skype or whatever at some point. I'm in Canada as well.

Edit:

I'm adding an edit to this post because I want to make it clear that asking for reassurance or wanting reassurance is totally normal and I'm not trying to make you feel bad about doing it. I'm not saying that you're failing in any way.

To be honest, if I hit my head against that sign, it would still cause me a lot of anxiety, although I would recognize that a lot of that anxiety was from OCD.

I would tell myself that I'm willing to risk whatever might happen in my attempt to heal and get back to normal life eventually.

I was only trying to emphasize the way to overcome OCD eventually. But there will be certain triggers, like hitting your head, that might be much harder and you might not be ready to deal with in the most appropriate way.
This is why we try to build a hierarchy of triggers and tackle them one by one, as we go up the ladder, everything gets a little easier.

So I totally empathize with your concern over hitting your head and understand why it's so upsetting.

Really appreciate your response