What Happens Immediately After the Injury?

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Please remember, we are not able to give medical or legal advice. If you have medical concerns, please consult your doctor. All posted comments are the views and opinions of the poster only.

To the woman who was in an abusive relationship and finally left. Go to a battered women's shelter near you and get in a program. I was also abused and walked away the first time he hit me. You are out but you need special counseling and help, but not just for a head injury. You need someone to work with your abuse. Get help now and live.

Can criminal charges be forced if a person hits you in the head and you already have a brain injury? I was recently sucker punched in the head by a male. I was diagnosed with hydrocephalus at the age of 16. I am 40 now? Could his cheap shot cause physical damage to my already existing condition?

You may feel that you are alone but this is a safe place to vent. You may also feel that you have trouble putting your words together but you have done an excellent job of informing others of the horror that occurs "behind closed doors " Have you sought counseling specifically from a counselor that works with DV? Please know that God knows and cares deeply and He WILL heal you, if you let Him. No person can judge you, you need to surround yourself with good people. Often DV support groups only foster contempt for the batterer. Haave you prayed for your X? That may sound erroneous but my verbally abusive husband that left our family for another woman was dying. When I went to see him 4 days before he died from 7 yrs. of cancer, I asked God to let me see him through Gods eyes. Although he never apologized I knew that God knew what Id gone through and that he was a sick man; emotionally, mentally and now (then) physically. Only by Gods grace was I able to let go and let God. Prior to that final visit I prayed for him even though I hated him. The only reason I prayed for him was because I had learned that satan wants to kill and destroy us and I did not want to fall in that trap. I also learned that I could not go on with bitterness sucking the life out of me. Unforgiveness is like drinking poison and expecting the other person to die. I will pray for you. May you experience the peace that passes understanding as you live your life knowing that God has a plan for you; for hope and a future.

I am praying for you. I am so sorry you have suffered so deeply through no fault of your own and that you feel abandoned. Please make several copies of what you have written here and distribute them to people: to your doctor, family members, a women's shelter, counselling centre etc. There is help out there for you and there are people who care deeply. Know that you are loved even if it doesn't feel like it. I will continue to pray and I know that others are praying too.

I think you are strong to tell your story. Many prayers for you.

My story is one people never hear or talk about. Before i get this off my chest, they say that once you have a blow to the head, then another before the first is able to heal, you make very poor decisions, and which I did. I was in an abusive relationship for 8, yes, 8 long yrs. The first blow lead to countless others one after another, repetitive blows. I feared this person and somehow from injuries, thought in my mind I loved, needed and couldn't live without this person, like Stockholm syndrome. I thought I loved him soo much that I could fix him. My anger, sadness, depression and uncontrollable emotional outbursts got worse and no one, not even myself understood what was going on with me. I was 26, beautiful and very smart, funny and considered "the life of the party". Now I'm 42 and no one understands. I've been called bipolar, crazy, my own sister told me " get some help you crazy bitch". My mother doesn't want to talk about it, my 20yr old daughter is even pulling away from me. I've lost everyone since my symptoms have gotten worse. I feel soo alone, hell, I am alone. I'm scared. I took soo many hard blows, they're countless. My sister was murdered by her husband in 2008 and THAT, FINALLY got me away alive. I can't remember where I'm going, what I was saying, how to put words together, severe headaches, severe mood swings, uncontrollable crying and sadness because I don't understand why my thoughts work the way they do. I have no one to turn to, no help, that's turning to no hope. Domestic violence... Ppl say "why didn't you leave, I don't feel sorry for you, it's your fault". I hope I can pull through this, cause I fear such damage has been done that it's even far worse than the MRI showed, the frontal lobe TBI. I look normal but that evil person changed my life forever. Like football players that are committing suicide because it's too overwhelming and no one, not even I understand how to fix myself. Domestic violence is not because the woman is an idiot, is probably because damage has been done to the brain. I'm not me anymore and feel that I probably never will be, even though EVERYDAY I try my hardest to be normal. I miss ppl in my life, I feel that I've been deserted... And I have. If anyone reads this, please pray for me. I'm completely terrified.

I pray for you. You are a good person.

I have never been a believer in yoga and meditation but I have discovered they really can help. Try Bikram. It will be totally physical to start with but after time you realise it goes much deeper than that.

Years ago I was attacked and sustained a head injury. I was unconscious and I lost my memory. I don't know anything about the hospital stay or anything. I didn't even get a diagnosis. My mom and sister picked me up from the hospital and I have not talked about it till now. It happened in 1987.

my vision is like double and i get dizzy. i was in a bad car wreck . i was in icu for 2 days, i had 3 broken ribs , a cracked pelvic bone and 32 staples. i was in hospital for 5 days now im home. i had my wreck on nov. 7 2015. how long will it take for my vision to go back normal ???

How do you categorize brain injury due to radiation damage that was given for a brain tumor? This happened to me and left me barely able to function and had to access many resources and therapies.

Recent studies and treatments are showing there is more neuroplasticity than this article indicates. In addition and based on my husband's personal experience and our observation of other brain injured people, hyperbaric oxygen therapy (HBOT) provides very significant healing, even 20 years after a brain injuring event (see https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4wa5Sjm_Nyo). For our veterans, the improvement HBOT offers is sufficient that state of Oklahoma has made law stating that veterans can get HBOT and the VA has to pay for it (see http://videos.oeta.tv/video/2365281649/). HBOT can give a person a life back instead of a life sentence.

I suffered severe brain trauma as a child and at the age of 58 became to have coherent return of my memory.  This article is very helpful.  I do wonder about the Rancho Los Amigos levels because my life is marked by much overlap.  I have always felt anxiety ridden and personally depressed while at the same time working, seeking out physical health and putting myself through college at night - very appropriate but intrinsically unhealed.  I feel I lived a bifurcated life.

What is a bifurcated life? I get the overlap but that would be sort of normal wouldn't it? I dont have a dictionary at hand and from the context I'm guessing just a bit screwed up, yes? That seems sort of normal as well so.......... what are you trying to say? How did you "become to have" coherent return of your memory at 58 , long after a childhood head injury? Did you suffer another head injury?
Have you finished your studies? You say you are anxious and depressed while working and going to school at night. That seems a good reason to be anxious but depression would be a shame while working so hard to improve yourself. Did your sudden return of memory stir up a previously unmanaged bit of your life?
Now would be a good time to manage that bifurcated intrinsically unhealed bit and get on with the rest of your appropriate life.
Stay well and get happy!!!!

What is a bifurcated life? I get the overlap but that would be sort of normal wouldn't it? I dont have a dictionary at hand and from the context I'm guessing just a bit screwed up, yes? That seems sort of normal as well so.......... what are you trying to say? How did you "become to have" coherent return of your memory at 58 , long after a childhood head injury? Did you suffer another head injury?
Have you finished your studies? You say you are anxious and depressed while working and going to school at night. That seems a good reason to be anxious but depression would be a shame while working so hard to improve yourself. Did your sudden return of memory stir up a previously unmanaged bit of your life?
Now would be a good time to manage that bifurcated intrinsically unhealed bit and get on with the rest of your appropriate life.
Stay well and get happy!!!!

The future in Brain Therapy is here. GyroStim therapy at www.cbp-centers.com gives new hope for patients with brain injury. The deep brain stimulation in the next generation activates the neuroplasticity of the brain - the brain's amazing capazity to "fix" itself.
CBP-Brain Centers in Colorado is the only place in the USA which offers this groundbreaking therapy. www.cbp-centers.com

This information is great and spot on but people with a brain tumor and brain surgery experience the same but do not get the TBI diagnosis. Is this because doctors are afraid to be sued. We need better awareness and support.

Damage can be seen through Spect-Imaging!!

How marvellous to read something that explains A.B.I. my son his two years into his recovery and his still in a rehabilitation unit.but l never give up hope.and visit every day. at

lovely explanation, this has been very help full in my revision for exams thank you.

Arthur Cortis, this comment of yours got me in a way I was completely unprepared for, like the two gunshots to the back of my head only few months back! But in this case, I've been there and I've seen it all happened. Life anew. Fears and many more fears. Trying to recognize the new person while still struggling to come to terms with the death of the old guy. It's an experience better imagined. The new normal is just as strange as the old death!

The "light" is full of fright...in your journey to return to normalcy from a TBI.

The above statement is chock full of misnomers,  but it is a beginning. Your journey has been heightened with opportunities never envisioned before. You just don't realize what is in front of you, yet. In time, everything comes into focus. How long this takes is different for everyone.

To come to terms with your new situation it must be realized you have entered into a new normal. Gone is the past you. Born again, with the benefit of prior knowledge. With benefits come anchors. Life is a balance...equalibrium is sought...you understand this much better after sustaining a TBI.

Once you come to terms with your new reality, then you can begin the road to enrichment of self. It is what it is because it is...searching, searching, searching...almost a requirement before you begin anew...make peace with new you and recall the situation is Just Right!!!

Preposterous, you say...begin anew!!!

Arthur Cortis

I'm very caught on this subject and really want to figure out how to heal axons. This article has helped me a lot and I hope to be back with more news. Thank you

From,

A  scientist

Beautiful and encouraging. I once had a mild concussion as I took a spill from a bike 1977 just after graduating college. My concearn fits more with ptsd as a result of severe psychological trauma at age 10 December 21 1965 when I found my mother unconscious (turned out she was dead - a suicide self inflicted gunshot wound). The shock and after effect traumatized me to this day Nov 19 2014. Despite college grad school and work I first saw a therapist at age 27. And now I know that trauma had a long term effect on my brain. I am now on SSDI and I feel my mind relaxing and slipping backwards. All I can do is go with the flow. I just read that healthy eating exercise brain stimulation will help me. My emotions are heightened from my childhood and I have an excellent psychiatrist. Thank you for your Godly words.

May 12th 2001 (Mother's Day) at the age of 16 I experienced a severe tbi. I wrecked a motorcycle doing (from what the police said) anywhere from 75-120mph head on into a ford f-550 service truck. I was in a severe coma for 3 1/2 weeks and literally died 4 time throughout the initial hours/days in the hospital. I was in the hospital for approximately 4 months total. Including the inpatient rehabilitation center. I had to learn EVERYTHING down to tieing my shoes but for some reason maintained a two year college level reading ability....i have a hard time remembering much of anything before that wreck happened to me and except for triggers once in awhile that bring back memories that sometimes I wonder if they are actual or fabricated by my brain. Because a lot of times my friends or family don't even remember them happening. It is now 9-22-14 and I am still here to tell you that recovery has been very long and difficult...I still struggle with anger/temper issues as well as impulsive decisions I make without thinking things all the way through before I move forward with the decision. I am a single father at the age of 28 raising a beautiful 8 year old son, I have an associates degree and am working a job that brings in close to 70,000 dollars a year. Now, with that. I am by no means trying to brag or flaunt about my success but rather provide inspiration to victims of tbi and families of tbi victims showing them that everything can work out to be ok. With my personal tbi, I had what you would call a subduralhematoma with my brain hemoraging (bleeding) inside my skull with no room to expand due to it being a closed head Injury. The doctors put a drain into my scull to relieve the preasure until swelling and bleeding subsided. I still have a large problem relatively often with my short term memory but it has improved over the years and I am still at high risk for having seizures. (Haven't had one yet) but in closing, If you are a victim of a tbi or family of a victim of a tbi (traumatic brain injury) reading this comment. DONT LOSE HOPE!!! DONT GIVE UP!!!! PERSEVERE THROUGH IT!!! It may not be the end all be all! Everything happens for a reason!!! You may never understand why so don even bother wasting your breath asking yourself that over and over and over. Just see it through. I hope everything works out for you as it has for myself.....and if you ever doubt the ability you do have to see it through to the end. Say a prayer! I will say one with you! I'm sorry you have to/are going through this. Either way you look at things...it will all work out. God bless you!

My brother is on life support with a moderate-severe tbi. It's only been 2 days. I'm searching for hope. This story is exactly what I needed to see. Thank you for sharing

Immediately after Injury I was in a hospital ,but now I'm at home continue my recovery . I still work on my memory and I don't want memory of my accident back to me. What the doctors say I had one year in  front of me. During this time I try to help my body doing YOGA exercises and continue to wait. If you have something to say or share your own experience please just write I will be very pleased to read it.

Have a good time and enjoy your life.

Reading comment from May 4th. I have had 3 bad head injuries resulting in associated nasal, hand, and multiple rib fractures. Right side, left side, back of head. Had swelling and bruising from top of visible head from top of forehead to bottom of jaw, actual lacerations thought of contusions when actually lacerations when swelling subsided. But I have never lost conscioueness and can in fact give detailed information on entire event. Therefore I feel I have been underdisgnosed and sent walking while if I had even tole doctors I was just momentarily unconscious my care would have improved. I think the Glasgow scale is wrong, archaic and intolerable to people likeyself. I think E.R.s need to be better trained in modern lab tests for injury extent and treatment. This included immediate and followup care. I like others can be very pleasant in the E.R. then do the suffering at home in order to avoid being a beligerent patient. I am a past R.N. who lived and breathed E.R. medicine and as a student was taken under mentoring by Dr. John Weigenstein, Lansing, Michigan who founded the Vollege of Emergency Physians taking it from moonlighting to a accepted field of medicine. If he saw I was worth teaching I must have some capacity for the area. In general I think E.R. physians need to have more required ongoing education and empathy. At a hospital in Lansing, Michigan, I had the shift director actually come to me and tell me the E.R. was for emergencies, not people like me. I will fight till he I repreprimded. So if you have a head injury be your own advocate, losing consciousness is NOT a sign of severity and get rid of the Glasgow scale now. July 12, 2014

I did not experience any loss of conciousness at the start of my TBI- however, I have now had it for over a year. This article seems to be mainly about what I now call 'typical head injuries', which is what also seems to happen to 95% of those with TBIs. I know that my specific case cannot be answered but I would like to put it out there that people with ongoing concussions with minor symptoms would like to be advocated for too.
Is there a Level IX: When cut & damaged lines are re-activated and firing, bringing along with it the top-awareness that sucumbed to the orginal damage about 36 hours after the initial injury? Is there a Level X: Where the lines created and developed out of necessity when the damage was done are able to recognize the newly healed pre-injury operating lines and grow new lines enableling full operating connections? What do I do if there isn't those Levels yet? P.S. I'm medically undocumented but for 1 CT. I don't have a Doctor either. ;) They looked kinda confused...

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