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- Fatigue following Traumatic Brain Injury (TBI)
- The cognitive effects of brain/head injury
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- “Here was a light behind the despair”
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- James Cracknell and Beverley Turner talk about brain injury
- “I’ve never met anyone so muddled in my life!”
- “Imagination is everything”
Monthly Archives: January 2011
Living with Long-Term Brain (Head) Injury
INTRODUCTION
Here is some “info”, that I summarised from a radio interview with a UK film-maker by the name of William Fairbank (http://www.williamfairbank.com) talking about the “hidden handicap, the silent epidemic”. (“It could have been me speaking” . . . but not nearly as eloquently* as William!)
Don’t see head injury as a ‘handicap’, but just another challenge to live with, work around and overcome in the amazing journey of life.
“Success to others may be apparent in what you DO; but significance, meaning and purpose lies, then reveals itself in what you ARE and BECOME down the ‘river of life’ – how and the spirit with which you face, then overcome the daily obstacles, the frequent trials and tribulations along the often rocky path-way of life’s magical and mysterious journey. Light your path brightly.”
– craig
About the Submitter:
Craig has a close personal interest in this area. He has had a long-standing head injury and has been researching and studying in this field for nearly twenty years. Craig hopes that by sharing this information, it will make some difference in those lives affected by brain injury.
P.S: To end off, enjoy these thoughts…
“We have it within; but we get it all from without. There is a well-spring of strength, wisdom, courage and great imagination within each one of us; but once we draw on this truth, it gets watered from without, by a Higher Source – the Source of Life and Love, which is God, the very Ground of our Being.”
When you can see no light at the end of the tunnel, light your own candle and let your light illuminate the world, like the radiance from a window at midnight.”
That’s a metaphor, BTW”
“The task ahead of you can always be overcome by the power within you…and the seemingly difficult path ahead of you is never as steep with the great spirit that lies within you.”
“When the world is filled with love, people’s hearts are overflowing with hope.”
– craig
This article may be freely reproduced electronically or in print. If through sharing a little of my experiences, it helps anyone “out there in the often very difficult, but always amazing ‘journey of life’ in any way, then I’m very happy.
*big word, eh!
Head injury has become a common problem throughout the world. Many of the more severe injuries are related to road traffic and horse riding accidents. As an example, in Great Britain about 15 patients every hour are admitted to hospital for observation, because of head injury and every 2 hours one of these will die. Head injury is implicated in 1 of all deaths and 50 OF ROAD TRAFFIC ACCIDENT DEATHS. Head injury is particularly prevalent in the age group between 10 and 25. CONCUSSION has occurred, whenever patients cannot remember the actual blow that made them unconscious.
LIVING WITH HEAD INJURY: What It Feels Like to Have A Head Injury?
There are many misconceptions and a great lack of understanding about this condition, so here is some general information that I hope may be able to help others.
Extreme fatigue. This is my area of greatest difficulty and has shaped my entire adult life (from age 15). I wake up every morning feeling very tired and washed-out. Heavy -headed…and have felt like this all my life. So I do my most demanding “work” involving thinking early in the morning and structure my day around this. I am typing this at 6.45 am.
Apparently neurosurgeons say that the effects of fatigue can prevent many highly-intelligent head-injured people from functioning fully in the formal work force. Doctors don’t even understand… so how can employers be expected to? Many people assume head injured people to be simply lazy, whereas they are just conserving energy (well how else could they avoid making judgments, when people with head injuries look so normal). That’s why it’s often referred to as “the hidden handicap”.
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Some Practical Issues in Dealing with Head Injury
Introduction:
Craig has a close personal interest in this area and has been researching and studying in this field for nearly twenty years. He hopes that by sharing this information, it will make some difference in those lives affected by brain injury.
There are many misconceptions and a great lack of understanding about this condition, so here is some general information that I hope may be able to help others.
*
Some common effects of head injury:
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Head Injury/Brain Injury) – Some Facts
Introduction:
Craig has been researching and studying in this field for nearly twenty years stemming from a long-standing head injury. He hopes that by sharing that it will make some difference in those lives affected by brain injury.
There are many misconceptions and a great lack of understanding in this area, so here is some general information that I hope may be helpful to others.
*
Head injury has become a common problem throughout the world. Many of the more severe injuries are related to road traffic and horse riding accidents. As an example, in Great Britain about 15 patients every hour are admitted to hospital for observation, because of head injury and every 2 hours one of these will die. Head injury is implicated in 1 of all deaths and 50 OF ROAD TRAFFIC ACCIDENT DEATHS. Head injury is particularly prevalent in the age group between 10 and 25. CONCUSSION has occurred, whenever patients cannot remember the actual blow that made them unconscious.
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Posted in brain injury, head injury
Tagged brain, medical information, medical resources, neuro-psychology
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The Cognitive Effects of Brain Injury
Submitter’s Note:
Craig has been researching and studying in this field for nearly twenty years stemming from a long-standing head injury. He hopes that by sharing that it will make some difference in those lives affected by brain injury. Craig likes to share knowledge and insights from his life experiences to try and help others. He hopes that by sharing, it will make some difference in those lives affected by brain injury.
*
Part of the text is reproduced by kind permission of Trevor Powell from his book ‘Head Injury: A Practical Guide’.
The cognitive effects of a brain injury affect the way a person thinks, learns and remembers. Different mental abilities are located in different parts of the brain, so a head injury can damage some, but not necessarily all, skills such as speed of thought, memory, understanding, concentration, solving problems and using language.
The cognitive system can be divided up into six separate areas:
The Lasting Effects from Blows to the Head (Concussion)
Article Summary: The brain damage sustained after a concussion is not always immediately apparent…and the effects can be long lasting A blow to the head that knocks a person unconscious can result in widespread loss of brain tissue …and this is why some people who suffer head injuries are never quite the same.
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“Compare it (your head) to a jelly in a bowl. The bowl is the skull – a strong, protective container – and the jelly (the brain) is nestled within. The skull is able to withstand many types of blows; but the brain is vulnerable to sudden swirling or rotating movements. Shake the bowl and see what happens to the jelly.”
– Don Mackie, Emergency Specialist, Hutt Hospital, Wellington, New Zealand
What Does it Feel Like to be Brain Damaged?
Submitter’s Note:
I am sharing this information in the spirit of promoting greater awareness of head (or brain) injury, as well as helping and hopefully encouraging “victims of the hidden handicap” to realise their full potentials and be all that they are capable of achieving and being.
Craig Lock
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Introduction
It is generally accepted that people working with individuals who have any type of handicap, should have a certain amount of empathy with their clients and should strive to understand how their clients feel and think. People working with those who are brain damaged have a particularly hard time doing so. One can have some understanding of what it means to be blind by simply closing one?s eyes; yet how can a normal person understand what it feels like to be brain damaged?
I am in the unusual position of being a trained clinical psychologist who suffered brain damage and who has slowly recovered most of my facilities. In other words, I have been on the outside looking in, and also, on the inside looking out at the world of the brain damaged person. At this point in my recovery, I have a foot in both worlds, for I can remember what it felt like to be completely normal intellectually, and also what it felt like when loss of function was at its worst.
Perhaps this informal and very subjective narrative may be of some help in assisting normal people to empathize a little better with the brain damaged individual. For, unfortunately, most brain damaged people are unable to explain precisely how they feel; those who have been brain damaged since birth, of course, have never had the experience of functioning normally and thus have no standard of comparison of their present state with that of others.
At the age of thirty-nine, I was an exceptionally healthy male with a keen interest in outdoor sports such as skiing, canoeing, and swimming. I had been a clinical psychologist for sixteen years and was married to a social worker; we had three children. I was active intellectually, reading a great deal both in and outside my field, and enjoyed classical music and playing the piano
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Sharing some Information and Thoughts on Head and Brain Injury 