Something really frightening happened to me a couple of weeks ago, the worst nightmare of many young people today! I had only been to the local garden centre, it was in my hand as I paid, then I went out to my car and drove straight home. I had it in my hand! The panic and anxiety that set in was truly quite traumatic! I checked my car again and again and by the time I had finished checking it for the seventh time the reality began to hit home and I was beginning to accept that I lost my phone! I loved my smart phone! What was I going to do? Whichever model phone I had at any time had been in ..read more

If you haven’t already done so then please read Part One by clicking this link: 21.) The Change Part One When I was discharged from Trafford General hospital on 27th October 2007 I was full of confidence, I had done really well in hospital and thought that nothing had changed so in a few weeks life would returned to normal. However I was soon to learn how hospital was a false and safe environment where everything is planned and organised, where your needs are totally taken care of without you even realising. I remember feeling very confident that I could walk out of the front door and do pr ..read more

I haven’t written one of these for a while and I have loads to say so ill do it in chunks. I write them primarily for anyone with a brain injury and if you are anything like me then you will have a terrible attention span so I try to keep to a max of 1500 words. This is the first chunk, I have no idea how many chunks there will be because I’m also terrible at planning but lets start before I use any more of my 1500 words! I was reflecting the other day on how much traumatic brain injury has transformed my life, the change was instant and much of my recovery has been adjusting to that change. T ..read more

A couple more tips that I have picked up along the way: Your brain is damaged and cannot do what it did before the accident, it is like a 3 legged donkey and you would not give a 3 legged donkey the same amount if anything to carry because its only got 3 legs. This doesn’t mean that the donkey is useless however, it just can’t do as much and sometimes needs a helping hand. Forgive the strange analogy but the idea is to make your brain do the least amount of unnecessary work as possible. In the last blog I wrote I mentioned forcing yourself to learn habits i.e. doing things automatically withou ..read more

The things I’ve talked about previously, although I’ve tried to put a positive spin on them are on the whole pretty negative subjects. Brain injury is negative and having a brain injury is hard, in fact I could think of something to moan about every single day. My memory is terrible, I tell someone and they say “yeah my memory is bad too” but its not like that, they have no idea! I’m always tired so I tell someone and they say “yeah I’m always tired too”. Alright Brooke we get it! Moaning about a situation improves that situation about as well as complaining about not having a Sixpack has give ..read more

I was asked recently by someone who has had a brain injury for about a year if things ever get better? You know what I can remember being exactly like that, I just waiting to heal so that I’d be better. All I could think of was being tired all the time, forgetting things, being left out and being that poorly person for the rest of my life. The one that has to go home early, the one that everyone worries about I was so negative and felt like such a waste of space! What happens is that after the initial trauma your brain is still in massive shock and you’re not able to think about things in any ..read more

I find that I am often misunderstood I can be a bit of a social nightmare and although I never mean any harm people so often seem to misunderstand me and take offence. I am always full of anxiety and thinking how I should have worded something differently. Maybe you meant to say something uplifting but it was taken as an insult? You wanted to give that girl a on the treadmill a compliment but it comes out as “you’re nowhere near as big as you used to be”. I’ve mentioned previously that I went on a date with a girl who didn’t have the freshest breath so I bought her a pack of chewing gum and sa ..read more

If I had £1 for every time I’d been asked what was it like being in a coma I wouldn’t be a millionaire! I’d probably have something like £17! Which in 2017 you’d be lucky to get 4 pints for, but 17 is quite a lot of times to be asked something! It is a subject people find intriguing and a good discussion to have over those pints. My unfortunate answer for those 17 is that I can’t bloody remember! I’ll tell you what I do know though: On 31st May 2007 my eyes opened for the first time as I started to wake from my coma. I’ve seen on tv and in films how waking from a coma is depicted as waking up ..read more

Ok I will finish my brain injury story but I have been asked to give a talk on employment after brain injury in September and it’s something I’m thinking about so I thought I’d write about that. I’d like to stress how lucky I am as someone who has survived a serious brain injury to be in a position where many forms of work are now an option to me. The after effects of traumatic brain injury can be so severe that the person may never recover to that level. If they are lucky however there will come a time where they want to stop taking from life in the form of rehabilitation and want to give som ..read more

A quick warning: This blog contains very grim and potentially upsetting scenes. I would recommend you avoid reading it particularly if you have experience of serious head injury, I would hate for it to trigger any traumatic memories!   If you haven’t yet read previous editions please start from the beginning by clicking here:   I missed a little bit out of the story, forgive me but I wasn’t conscious! I forgot to mention that I had a faith healer called Jean! On the 3rd day, Jay (my sister’s boyfriend) asked if my family would have anything against a faith healer coming to visit? A ..read more