Electrode to the Forehead
The question is always the same, “What would you like today?”
I’ve almost exhausted my options. It’s either flying a geometric spacecraft through wormholes or driving one of several types of cars over various landscapes. I opted to take the Camaro for a spin through the lava fields. As usual, my mind wanders through fields of noise. I think about what I’ll do at work, wonder if the therapy is working, and probably the strangest obsession during therapy is wondering what the algorithms look like that guide the car through the course. I am always impressed at how robust the software appears to be. Jumping off cliffs, crashing into barricades, and plummeting into lakes of molten lava. The car shudders and smokes as the screen fades to various stages of inattention before righting itself on the course path. I want to reach for a steering wheel but can only do that virtually.
After 15 minutes the doctor paused the game and moved the electrode from the right side of my head to my forehead. He asked what I’d like to improve, anxiety or concentration. Since anxiety hasn’t ever really been an issue, I opted for the giant problem in the room, focus and concentration.
For the remainder of the session I raced the jacked up Chevy around the course. It didn’t feel much different other than I had a wire glued to the front of my head. I still couldn’t control the car like a Jedi master would. “Too much noise in the upper works,” as my 6th grade teacher would have said. Actually, he used the term, “Touched in the upper works” to describe the various misadventures of me and my compadres. Come to think of it, where did that memory just come from? That was 37 some-odd years ago. Maybe it’s working after all… I was advised (warned) that childhood memories could possibly percolate to the surface during therapy.
I wonder what other clowns and demons lurk beneath that swamp of childhood?
In: Depression · Tagged with: bi-polar, Depression, Neurofeedback, unable to concentrate