TBI Voices

Music After Severe Brain Injury: Helena Part One Helena Realizes She Still Had the Music After Severe Brain Injury, in Her We have discussed in other stories the question of who survives. The story of Helena comes out strong on the side of the debate that the fundamental core person survives...
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Before Severe Traumatic Brain Injury: Helena Part Two In one of the great compliments that can be paid to anyone, Helena has lived an interesting life, the brain injury perhaps adding another diverse chapter to it. She was a twice divorced woman before severe traumatic brain injury, with little family who..
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TBI Therapy: Helena Part Three In part three we talk about the TBI therapy that Helena received in the hospital and as can be expected the lack of TBI therapy she received because of her insurance. There is always sadness secondary to any serious injury or surgery, more so for someone..
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Discharged After TBI: Helena Part Four One of the flaws in a system that pushes injured brain injury people out of the inpatient environment before recovery is well advanced, is that not everyone has a suitable place to go once they are discharged after TBI. As explained in the prior part,..
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TBI Treatment: Helena Part Five Support – family, friends, church – is a critical element to recovery. Yet, love and care is not enough. Recovery requires professional TBI treatment, or the equivalent, to enable a brain to reacquire the knowledge, the neural connections. As can be expected, getting TBI treatment was..
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Treating Cognitive Deficits: Helena Part Six Identifying and Treating Cognitive Deficits The first major step towards recovery for Helena was the neuropsychologist for identifying and treating cognitive deficits. She explains: That was a very, very good experience. He spent time with me beforehand. I went through this four or five hours..
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Despite TBI: Helena Part Seven There is a Don McLean song American Pie, with the line, the “Day the Music Died” in reference to the airplane crash that took the lives of Buddy Holly, Ritchie Valens and the Big Bopper. December 17, 2007 was not such a day. For Helena the..
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Silent Song of Brain Injury: Helena Part Eight As Helena tells it, her life, despite a life that was dominated by melody, the background noise was drowning out the harmony. In simplifying her life to accommodate to her brain injury, she believes she has found renewed faith and a quieter soul..
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Post Brain Injury: Helena Part Nine Church, God, Music. Those are critically important to Helena, but she is also a woman of this world, who must survive day to day post brain injury. She describes her current circumstances post brain injury: I live independently but I live in an apartment house..
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Work for Brain Injury Survivor: Helena Part Ten This sense of what is best for her, what pace she can handle didn’t come automatically. She became keenly aware of how overwhelming the pace of information could be when she attempted to learn a new profession to go back to work for..
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