Dig up the rush

Childhood memories for me are rather dubious due to my skull having been cracked open when I was___ um (hah) 9___ maybe 10. All I know is I was one age when it happened & woke up three months later an age older, w/ seven staples in my head. Every day I miss the place I went during those three months, & I remember it better than I am able to pull up memories of being a child or an adolescent (that's a story for another day though). Most of my life I've been studying human behavior/psychology. Self-examination is where it began, because the wreckage was such that I was required to develop my own tools in order to cope w/ life. The further I got into psychology the more certain aspects made sense, but there was a particular day. Back in college, in one of many psych classes, I was taught that in the case of a traumatic incident resulting in amnesia, the memory/information of the trauma is still buried in the subconscious. Like certain wires get crossed to protect ourselves, & at any time___ any second, some external event could trigger the return recollection of said incident. A fact I found quite intriguing, because it also means that all the memories lost could still be uncovered. That day I decided to take on the task of digging out my childhood, because at that point it was as if I didn't have one. It felt like I was born at 16! Something I couldn't tolerate w/out investigation. The trick was finding a method/strategy that was effective. I used my writing___. & yes, I found some of the memories. Once my method was well in place/use___ it opened a strange sort of flood gate. It didn't ALL rush back to me at once___. After having retrieved a good hand-full of childhood memories, I stopped, because I didn't want to see anymore. Even after having ceased my initial dig, I still get flashbacks at what appear to be random times. Each day I still ponder the potential of regret for having done so, because it's not just the fact of the incident that disturbs me. Everything I pulled back out has only brought me sorrow I must continually reconcile w/.
Please consider the above words as an overture to what I initially set out to say.
There are two blurred memories from elementary school & middle school of me speaking to each of my parents about why the children & faculty treated me like a leper. I wanted to know exactly why they were cruel to me, because I didn't fully understand that I was born a different type. My parents raised me to think for myself, & I hit the ground running on that mentality. I wasn't so much a bad child, just different, because no matter what I stood out from the rest. Even before public school I was wearing black, which to many members of society is an indication of a negative mindset. Something that isn't necessarily true, ___I wore black as a child for functional reasons: it made getting dirty easier to deal w/ & I was always cold (I knew dark colors attract heat from the sun). After listening to what my parents had to say, I decided to take the chameleon stance. It was an experiment that went over rather well actually, until I got sick of click-pop bullshit, & returned to school in my regular garb. The kids asked what happened, why did I change BACK, & I told them I realized it wasn't worth it to try & be something I'm not. Of course, they returned to treating me w/ derision. Eventually I came to terms w/ being 'on the outside looking in' & that I didn't want to be on the inside. I knew for certain it was better for me to just do my own thing. Every now & then, if they were giving me a particularly hard time, I would go back into chameleon stance for awhile just to mess w/ their heads. Somewhere in all that a balance was developed, where they showed me some strange degree of respect & would even come to me for various reasons when their friends weren't looking. I guess because I did what I wanted, found a way to bend the rules, & didn't take shit from anyone___ including the faculty.
In short, I'm not this way exactly by choice or due to my brain damage.
A somewhat ironic memory though___: the day of the accident, by choice (not playing chameleon) I was wearing red shorts & a white shirt that tied in the front. That day I just wanted to, & I didn't even understand why. It took years for me to remember those red shorts & little white shirt___. They were shredded, covered in blood & were cut off my body once they got me to the hospital. I never dressed like that again___.