Yesterday I shared with all of you dear readers that Sam has a traumatic brain injury. Some of you may know this because I have shared this before in other posts, some of you may not have known at all.
A traumatic brain injury (or TBI) is a complex injury. Sam had his clock cleaned too many times on various deployments. Most of his TBI’s are from being struck by IED’s (I wrote a piece on that too, and how we have part of one in our home).
Each brain injury is different. Sometimes the injury can limit the use of a specific part of the body, sometimes the recovery is challenging (and it is different for each person as well).
No two brain injuries are alike.
Sam will always have some type of memory loss. Because of that, certain tasks (like remembering readings from school assignments) are challenging. A simple task like grabbing your wallet before you head out the door, remembering keys and cell phone for work, or taking a packed lunch to work is a challenge (we had the lunch moment today: Sam packed his lunch and left it out on the counter).
Sometimes Sam requires some help: a reminder from me, his phone, and Alexa (even Caden) to take his meds, there are times where he has to ask about a name, place or date because he simply cannot remember.
Along with TBI comes headaches, memory loss, difficulty thinking, and even mood swings. Sam suffers from headaches, and sometimes they are so bad he has to try and lay down (take meds) and get some rest.
I noticed a link on Facebook the other day. I saved it. It is called “The Invisible Rain Cloud,” a short story about traumatic brain injury. It is a video, which I think explains a lot about brain injuries. I cannot speak of what it is like to live with a brain injury, but I think this video can offer insight into how different brain injuries can be.
Here’s the link:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m5D4aHLYhPI
Take a few minutes to watch and learn a little bit about this sometimes invisible injury that some of our veterans face. Note: some…not all.