Contributors cast minds back to Head Injury   

FEATURED within the My HIStory podcast are many  first hand accounts of those who have suffered head injuries, the impact it has had on their lives as well as how Head Injury Support has helped them in the aftermath.

  Two of these individuals are Joe and Fiona who both suffered traumatic brain injuries and were in an induced coma for an extended period of time.

For Joe he did find it somewhat difficult contributing his story to the podcast as it is something that he finds he has to repeat at least five times a week considering what happened to him.

        Joe’s Story

“It was tough going through the story in the podcast because it is something you find you have to repeat at least five times a week. People see you and you have to explain your situation. For me it was an awkward scenario because I had to end up moving from Scotland back to Ireland. “I was running into people and all they heard was Chinese whispers regarding what happened to me. Some people were shocked to see me walking down the street because I was told that I would never be able to walk again.    

“I suffered my Head Injury two  years ago in September 2023.  

“I was living in Edinburgh at the time and there was a concrete stairwell up to the flat I was living in. Then one evening after work when I was coming home I fell down.  I just rolled my ankle on one of the steps and went over the banister and hit my head several times of the steps as I was going down. Thankfully my partner at the time was an NHS nurse and she heard it. If she didn't react as quick as she did at the time I wouldn't be here.

“Then I just awoke seven months later after being in an induced coma for so long.        

“When I was in the induced coma I had a stroke and I spent 8 months in a rehabilitation hospital learning to walk again. My speech became a bit slurred for a while. Because the stroke was on the right side of my brain my left side of the body was quite weak and there was muscle fatigue from being in a come for so long.

“ I use to be in a band years ago and I am trying to relearn the guitar. For me it is motion. In my mind I know where my fingers should go on a guitar but it just doesn't compute with my hand. It is almost trying to learn again. It gets frustrating after a while. Sometimes it is just picking it up and hoping that you are going to strum the right cord, sometimes you do sometimes you don't.  It could be something as simple as buttoning your shirt. Every so often you forget.

I am still trying to get things together.”

Whilst Joe in his own words cannot fault the NHS for the care that he received during his time in hospital, as is the lived experience of many of those who have suffered a head injury he found that support did wane after he was discharged from hospital. This is where Head Injury Support stepped in.  

“I cannot fault the NHS, the HSC or Irish healthcare but when you leave hospital all the support  tends to disappear and to have somewhere like Head Injury Support in Newry this was fantastic. Everyone is going through the same thing, they feel like they may not be achieving enough and everyone is suffering from poor mental health. It is really  just a safe space to come to and talk.”

Fiona’s story

  Also   contributing her story to the My HIStory podcast was Fiona who having been one of the founding members of the organisation which would ultimately become Head Injury Support still regularly attends the venue almost 20 years after sustaining her head injury.   

“I didn't mind telling my story to the podcast because to me it is a story in a book because I don't remember it at all.

“I am 38 and I was 19 years of age when I sustained my brain injury. Next year it will be 20 years.

“I was in my final year at Saint Mark's Warrenpoint doing A-levels. The girls and I were out for the night. Our A levels were over and we were going to university. We were going to get a taxi home, myself and the  two other girls with me . We went across the road and my friend was in front of me and I was about a meter away from the curb and all of a sudden I got hit and knocked down. I have no memory of this whatsoever, it is what people told me.

“I was taken to Daisy  Hill for a night or two and I had to get surgery. They had to operate and  remove a bit of the bone from my skull for it to swell up inside. They said they had a plate ready to put in my head but they ended up not putting it in. They cut the bone out and then they put the bone in my hip for six weeks.

“I was unconscious in the Royal for three and half months. After this I was moved to Musgrave. I was one of the very first patients because it had just opened whenever I went into it. I was there for four months trying to relearn everything, who my family was, learning to walk and talk. I had no function to do anything. I was like a reborn child at 19 years of age. Back to learning everything.

“I was in Musgrave for four months and it took them time to send me out. I did have difficulty walking but I had to get on with it and practice makes perfect.”  

Headway

It was following the immediate aftermath of Fiona being discharged from Musgrave hospital that deliberations would take place which would see the establishment of the Headway Organisation which would ultimately develop in Head Injury support as we know it today.     

“I was referred to Cedar. They were doing things for people who have difficulties such as head injuries. We were in a room and there were a couple of people with brain injuries. We were just sitting around talking. My parents were there and Sean Downey's parents were there and they were talking back and forth.

“We were going there once every week and we were discussing that we should get together and start a group for people with brain injuries for a week to do things. They were back and forth trying to arrange things like this and a group called Headway came out of this.

“This is why we got it going. I am here most days doing Art. I forgot how to walk and talk but I did'nt forget how to paint. Without Head Injury Support I don't know where I would be.”