Without reconciling it with gift, the gift is lost and the curse consumes. Despair is the natural outgrowth of exaggerated curse. To protect against despair, some would deny their feelings. They assume the stance of stoic stiffness to prevent feeling devastated. Or so it would seem.
Stoicism violates our integrity in another way, by preventing intimacy, that is a certainty.
The price of this stiff, stoic non-feeling stance is an added tragedy. Not only is the paradox of gift and curse eliminated, but so is emotional involvement in one's life. Giving in to despair and becoming a victim of the tragedy also destroys the integrity of reconciling the paradox of the gift and curse of brain damage. The vulnerability and passivity of victimhood are not balanced by strength and activity. The crash into victimhood may yield sympathy but it will never yield integrity or real intimacy.