City: Davenport, Iowa

Brain Injury: I suffered multiple frontal-lobe strokes due to my lupus. The left brain was worse than the right.

Explanation of Mask: Before my stroke I was very pissed and depressed that I had lupus. I didn’t want it. I was going in for my three-month check up when I had high blood pressure and blood in my urine. I was sent over to a nephrologist, who told me I needed a kidney biopsy. The day after I had it, I had my strokes. For the next week, I don’t remember anything, but apparently I was talking. Then, the next week I was getting better, but I was still calm and confused. They told me I had a stroke, but I was annoyed and wanted to go home. Then, my blood pressure was 230 and wouldn’t go down, so I went back to the hospital and found out that my carotid arteries were stenosid, and that’s why I had a stroke. I felt both worried but also calm, if that makes sense. As if I’m nervous about myself, but that I’m taking things one day at a time. On my mask, I have white space where my storks were, and alligator representing my trouble finding words, faces of all my visitors which were at times overwhelming, a graph showing my progress, but also my carotid arteries, which I am afraid won’t go back down. Also, my face is grey, because I feel so calm and kind of blah.