I am mourning the loss of a childhood friend of the family. The man was my dentist, my father (an OBGYN) delivered his daughter, and his parents taught me to ski and installed me in the Junior Ski Patrol!
Dr. S was in a plane crash in which he lost an eye. Over time he declined precipitously, quitting dentistry, becoming an alcoholic, suffering terrible mood swings and depressions (he attempted suicide) and clearly experiencing dramatic cognitive loss. At the time everyone just shook their heads and was disgusted about how he 'fell apart' and couldn't pull himself back together. His wife divorced him and he lost nearly all of his friends. His parents took him in for awhile, and he eventually went to work for the forest service, getting a job and a small cabin at the Grand Canyon. He died there in his cabin last week of unknown causes.
Knowing what I do now it's crystal clear that he suffered the aftermath of acute traumatic brain injury. It pains me that he was so ridiculed, not the least by himself, about the changes he underwent. Only now, more than 30 years later are we beginning to have a glimmer of understanding about what goes on in the brain after TBI. It seems we had to have the ability to SEE damage to believe it was there. Until then it was just a character flaw and we declared there was no medical reason for 'bad behavior'. We have a whole new set of TBI sufferers experiencing injuries unlike anything we've seen before thanks to their excellent armor and the IEDs in this newest of wars. It struck me when I looked back over my dentist's life, that his symptoms mirror what my classmate describes when she talks about TBI in Iraqi soldiers, her specialty. After 'recovering' from the initial trauma, they look ok and that lasts about 6 months or so. Then they start to struggle. Depression sets in, mood swings, suicidality and everything I described above in the dentist. But because at the 6 month mark they look pretty intact, the military declares that whatever their problem is, it must not be related to their war trauma, so tough luck, you're on your own buddy! Worst of all, we often send them back into battle!!!
It kills me that now we know more, we may still condemn people to struggle the way Dr. S. did. I hope we can turn that around soon...
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3 comments:
What a sad story. And unfortunately what you describe is all too common, especially with veterans. Even though it's sad that we don't believe people without evidence, it's good that we're making progress in being able to see the damage so that maybe there will be less blame and more help.
Very sad story. It's amazing how TBI's can change someone's life so much, and tragic that other people in his life didn't understand back then what was going on.
Donna
The number of TBIs coming back from OIF / OEF is staggering. I'll (hopefully) be starting my TBI rotation in a few months, so this post really struck home.
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