Traumatic Brain Injury (TBI) Lawyer and Attorney
Recognizing Traumatic Brain Injury Signs you or your loved one may have a Brain Injury:
- severe headache that does not go way or get better
- seizures: eyes fluttering, body going stiff, staring into space
- memory problems / forgetfulness
- hands shake, tremors, muscles get weak, loss of muscle tone
- repeated nausea or vomiting
- Irritable, anxious or restless
- Easily frustrated or gets upset
- Too easily over-reacts, cries or laughs
- Wants to be alone or away from people
- Blames other for everything
- Is afraid of others
- Wants to be taken care of
- Doesn't know how to act with people
- Takes risks without thinking first
- Sad and depressed "Can't get started", doesn't want to do anything
- Dramatic changes in motor skills
- Changes in eating behavior: eats too little, too much or things that aren't food
- Changes in sexual behavior
Often, the effects of minor to moderate brain injuries are not immediately apparent. Many months may go by before brain injury changes become apparent. Even then, special training and expertise are required to properly diagnose such impairments. Such fields of specialization are known as Neuropsychology and Neuropsychiatry.
Recognizing such problems is made even more difficult by perceptual and expressive impairments caused by brain injury. Brain injury causes diminished self-awareness that interferes with the ability to recognize changes in the self. It also causes mental confusion and a sense of uncertainty about experiences. Difficulty finding familiar words to communicate thoughts and desires hinders communication and fuels frustration. Many individuals do not report such symptoms out of fear of being thought of as mentally unsound. Others are shamed by such symptoms in themselves.
Additionally, the very nature of brain injury interferes with the ability to recognize the problem. Frequently, brain injury causes memory impairments and expressive disorders. In real terms, this means that even when the memory survives the words might become elusive. Such impairments can hamper the ability to provide the doctor an accurate symptom picture.
After brain injury, things that once were easy and familiar become strange and difficult. Intensive mental effort is usually required to do things that required little or no effort before brain injury. Work and school, personal and family life often suffer too. Typically, children become unmanageable, grades drop, personalities change and they regress to an earlier developmental stage.
In adults, deadlines are missed, jobs are lost, savings dwindle and nerves fray. Behavior regresses and becomes unpredictable, unreliable, frequently inappropriate, and sometimes violent, role reversals are common. While only one family member may have sustained a brain injury the entire family suffers from its massive intrusion.
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