forgetting my heart

When I was in college I spent a semester living in Germany and traveling around Europe. I started taking German in 9th grade, but 7 years later when I went to Germany, I still struggled with basic conversation. Many of my classmates grew up in German speaking families and they had a distinct advantage being bilingual. By the time I came back home though, I was fluent enough that I could carry on all my daily activities, eating, shopping, traveling, finances, etc in German. I was really proud of that accomplishment. When I returned though, i experienced something unusual that I haven’t heard other people talk about, but there has to be a name for this. As the time since I’d returned from Germany increased, I didn’t have the opportunity to practice conversation, so I started forgetting a lot of it. The funny thing is that when I forgot a German word, I forgot the corresponding English word for a while too. I actually had a lot of trouble just having a normal conversation in english. It may not have looked like it from the outside, but inside my brain I struggled to have simple conversations while searching for the English translation of the German word I’d forgotten. I feel like I’m experiencing something similar with Michael. He dealt with his disability from his brain surgery for nearly 3 1/2 years before he died. He never drove again after that surgery and it was his number one goal to drive his Jeep. He had purchased it only a month...
Source: Mr. Hassle's Long Underpants - Category: Emergency Medicine Authors: Tags: Tales grief Source Type: blogs