"Brain injuries are not only blows to the head."”

GILPIN COUNTY — I have often heard people sound exasperated when they hear that it is another special month or day of awareness of one thing or another. Why do we have to give a certain group or cause special attention for a month?

My response is that the people or cause we are honoring have been left invisible by society. They need to be visible. Spending time in conversation and gaining correct knowledge on the subject will advance the cause and help in understanding its truth.

A couple of weeks, ago my son reminded me that March was Brain Injury Awareness Month. My son is 15 years old. Why is a 15 year old interested in, or even aware, that March is Brain Injury Awareness Month?

Just shy of two years ago, our life with his brain injury began.

The beginning of a brain injury is about survival. The brain is the body's control room so each injury needs to be treated individually and every person is on their own journey. No brain injury, reaction, treatment, or time recovering is the same.

My son's experience was so rare that it took weeks for doctors to diagnose. Brain injuries are not only blows to the head. He grew weaker and weaker as they checked things off the list. It was not an esophagus or intestinal issue. It was not a cancer that they could tell. It was not meningitis or multiple sclerosis.

He lost the ability to walk. The muscles in his legs didn't work anymore. How was this possible? He played soccer, he was a fast runner and he loved biking. One night while at Children's Hospital he became confused and could not answer basic questions. One of the lowest points was when the doctor asked, "Who is this lady next to you?" My son did not know who I was.

My throat tightened. I couldn't breathe. I tried to turn away before the tears spilled our. A voice I didn't recognize said, "Why is she crying?"

It felt like a long time before I could utter the words, "What is happening to him?"

There were no immediate answers. There were more tests and so many beeping machines, tubes, needles, and nurses in and out hour after hour.

He survived.

Vitamin deficiency. He was diagnosed with ARFID (an eating disorder) and Wernicke's Encephalopathy. Like all families, when someone has a brain injury we entered into the world of intense physical therapy, occupational and speech therapy. There was the nutritionist to speak to, there would be surgery, and endless appointments would follow.

Seeing my son learn to walk when he was 11 months old was a beautiful sight. Seeing him having to be lifted by a nurse to go from a bed to a chair day after day and the excruciating process of learning how to walk and climb stairs again at age 13...that was some of the most difficult, incredible, and triumphant sights to see and be a part of.

After a brain injury and the physical injuries start to function again and insurance deems you ready to go home, which is a relief and scary at the same time, you realize that life is not going back to what it was. There are good days and bad days for the person with the brain injury and for the caretakers. The injuries are more invisible, complex, and at times impossible to understand.

The Brain Injury Association of America understands the monumental struggle, "Brain injury, whether from trauma, stroke, or other causes, is a major public health challenge with immense personal, societal, and economic impacts. Thanks to advances in science and care, more people than ever are surviving and striving after brain trauma.

"However, barriers to care, a lack of awareness, underdiagnosis, and the chronic nature of brain injury have resulted in an incomplete representation of brain injury, with millions of survivors and their loved ones navigating a fragmented, inconsistent, under-resourced system."

Everyone who has a brain injury has their own story. Every family involved is on a journey navigating a system of therapists, doctors, hospitals, insurance, and I haven't even brought up the school system.

There are triumphs, setbacks, dead ends, amazing experts to work with, and people who have my son's best interests in mind. I suspect all this is a part of our lives now.

I write this with the hope that there will be more awareness of brain injuries and ARFID. Avoidant/Restrictive Food Intake Disorder (ARFID) is a complex eating disorder that has connections to anxiety and sensory issues. It is not a behavioral choice nor is it motivated by body image. It is mostly unknown and misunderstood.

Our social systems, including medical, mental health, and education, need to learn how to care and work with people with brain injuries.

The Brain Injury Association of America states, "While advances in acute care triaging, stroke awareness, and combat care mean that more people are surviving brain injuries than ever, survivors often require chronic or lifetime care."

This means more therapists, psychologists, and others with the expertise of how to help the young to the old with brain injuries, are needed in clinics, schools, nursing homes, hospitals— anywhere the people are.

People with brain injuries and living with the effects want to work, and graduate, and not have the anxiety or depression that often comes with the injury. They need the support and the flexibility to be in situations that work with them. Not trying to fit into a situation that no longer is a possibility for them to navigate.

March is Brain Injury Awareness Month. Be aware all year round of your neighbors near and far, no matter their age or situation, who have a brain injury and are daily impacted by it.