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I have to be honest. My doctor told me for years to do breathing exercises before I actually took them seriously. I just thought it seemed like it was too simple of a fix for my very complicated health issues. Part of me, took it as an insult, like he was saying, "Just calm down and breathe, and you'll be fine." I started to find research studies confirming intentional breathing's direct effect on the brain and body's ability to heal. Even then, I didn't take it seriously enough to do them regularly. Excuse the Brain injury pun, but I can be a bit hard headed sometimes. When I became pregnant last year, however, I had extra motivation. I read about how the muscles/ligaments that open the cervix during the birthing process are controlled by the parasympathetic nervous system (aka the rest and digest response.) Likewise, the muscles/ligaments that close the cervix to stall labor are directly tied to the body's sympathetic nervous system (aka fight or flight). I knew I was coming in with a disadvantage because of a history of multiple TBI’s causing a tendency for my brain to be in a fight or flight state. So I knew that I r eally needed to train my body to get into a parasympathetic mode if I wanted to have a successful natural birth. It wasn't until I did a mental performance session where I was hooked up to a bunch of machines that were reading my heart rate variability, skin conductance, muscle tension, etc. that I was able to see the power that simple breathing exercises had on my body's ability to go into a parasympathetic state where it could rest, digest, birth, handle stress, and ultimately heal. I literally saw a night and day difference in my body's response right there in a graph on the computer screen after only minutes. I have since worked breathing into my daily habits, even if I just have a few minutes here and there, while sitting in a waiting room, in the car, or when feeding my baby. I've noticed not only the acute effects on how I feel in the moment, but also the huge difference they make in my overall health when done consistently.

You ask and do not receive, because you ask with the wrong motives, so that you may spend what you request on your pleasures. James 4:3 When we went from word of faith / name it and claim it Christianity, to simple obedience and surrender, everything changed. If worldly success and influence with a side of “I'll use my platform to talk about Jesus” is the goal, you may want to start reading your whole Bible more, and not just cherry-picking verses like we were. There is nothing wrong with prospering, and nothing wrong with confessing scripture and building your faith. However, when we use scripture to twist Yah's arm into giving us what we want instead of asking Him what His will is, we’ve got it backwards. When we are visualizing and manifesting things that He never meant for us to have, then we are walking in dangerous territory. Many times, what my husband and I truly thought was the will of God for our lives actually wasn’t. Sometimes he would allow some success or some healing, and yes, even use it for His glory, but most of the time we were working our butts off and left wondering why isn’t God moving in this like we thought He would? Is our faith not strong enough? Did we not visualize it enough? Do we just need to work harder? Sometimes we can be disappointed with God for not helping us climb the ladder of success, or angry with Him when he lets us completely fall off of it. Meanwhile, we fail to see that all along, we’ve had our ladder leaned up against the wrong building to begin with! I don’t think it was a coincidence that after working so hard to get out of debt for so many years, breakthrough happened when we finally died to ourselves and gave it all to the Father. It was no longer "Lord, this is what we want to do and we're expecting you to bless it." but "Lord, your will be done. Tell us what to do." It was no longer "Lord, when we get out of debt and we get this or that, we will use it for your glory." but "Lord everything we have is yours and we will use it for your kingdom right now and if you want to bless us with a bigger house to pack more people in then so be it." So He tested us to see if we would choose obedience over our dreams. Even when it meant giving up the business that we thought would be our means to get out of debt. Even when it meant getting rid of nearly everything we owned, and leaving friends and family to move across the country. Even when the 3 months of renting while we look for property, turned into 3+ years. It's amazing how after that surrender and simple obedience, He broke generational chains, and we became debt free at a supernatural pace that only the Lord could take the glory for. For years, I did everything I could physically do to heal, confessed all the scriptures and renewed my mind, but it wasn’t until I finally died to my own ambitions and surrendered completely to the Lord that He delivered me from so much spiritual bondage and my healing excelled miraculously. It's not a coincidence that this is when He finally revealed who I really was and entrusted me with His true purpose for my life. Looking back, I see that sometimes we weren’t seriously asking Him what His will was out of fear of the answer we might receive. Other times our ability to clearly hear His will was hindered by idols we didn’t even know we had. Don’t get me wrong, a bigger house/ property is definitely still on our prayer list, and I am still standing in faith for complete wholeness in my body, but it’s not so that we can "achieve our dreams" and “live our best life.” It’s so we can be even more effective in doing the will of our Heavenly Father; that HIS glory may be revealed. Not our will Lord, but yours be done, and in Your perfect timing. In the meantime, we will use the health and resources you’ve already given to us to advance your Kingdom, for your glory. Everything is His. Give me Jesus.

"Come on honey, you can do it,” my husband encouraged as he sat me up and massaged my arms and legs. He picked me up out of bed like a ragdoll and held me up until my body grew strong enough to stand on its own. Once again, he had come home on his lunch break to find me still in bed. He helped me to the bathroom where there was already a chair waiting. After brushing my teeth, I sat in the chair and stared at the wall another 15 minutes before I realized I was doing it, then shuffled to my closet as if carrying an extra hundred pounds. Overwhelmed at the complexity of dressing myself, I just stood there staring until my legs buckled and I spent another 10 minutes or so lying on the floor. Eventually I found some jeans, put on a t-shirt and flip flops, and drove to work in a daze, 3 hours late, again. Everyday was pure survival, I was a walking zombie. The harder I tried to push through tasks, the harder I collapsed. My husband would just put a pillow under my head and there I'd be on the floor, wondering what was happening to me. I was always an honor student and state champion athlete; the “tough girl” who would even compete with pneumonia. Yet, here I was at 25, unable to get myself out of bed, or understand and follow simple directions. I’d had a considerable amount of health challenges before and was able to push through pain, nausea, etc… But this was different. I couldn't force my body to move when it refused. “You have a problem”, my neurologist said as he looked over my sleep latency test results. “You have narcolepsy. You were born with it and it's incurable. You'll need to take these meds to cope.” Wonderful. Another “incurable” condition I can add to the list that doctors had been giving me for years. I had been labelled with more disorders and syndromes than I could even recall, but in my spirit I knew not to accept this one either. Another Sunday, another healing altar call, another disappointment. I prayed for others and watched others get healed, and I got…. A word. But I held onto that Rhema God spoke to me one desperate night. He said, “I am going to heal you and use science, but I get the glory .” Often, God uses science, but people give credit to the Doctor or to science itself instead of the very One who made science and designed every intricate detail of it for us to heal. I started researching my symptoms and even ordered my own lab testing online. Some would warn against this, and I understand. You can Google a hangnail, and before you know it, you have 6 months to live. But, when you're as sick as I was, you don't fear anything. There's no energy for fear, and what's the big deal about death when you can’t live much of a life anyway? When every doctor you have seen has given up on you because your situation was too complicated, or worse, suggested your illness was “all in your head,” you keep searching. Even if you’re the only one who believes there is still hope. I am so thankful I did, because a test I ordered personally online, only by the guidance of Holy Spirit, is what led to my biggest breakthrough. It was around this time when a special guest spoke at a women's conference I was attending and referenced Proverbs 31:15 “She rises while it is yet night...” (ESV) I hid those words in my heart for years. I kept educating myself about healing, spirit, soul, and body. Oddly enough, it seemed I could help others with everything I was learning, but yet, I was still sick. I was no longer able to work and medical expenses were piling up. At times, I felt like a helpless burden and I was sorry for my husband that he ever married me. There were long periods, I would only leave the house a couple times for church, meetings, or medical appts. I would try to attend social events, but the energy it took to appear “normal” and keep up with others would leave me in bed for days after. Besides, listening to the conversations of my peers would only intensify the loneliness I felt. I would try to smile and act interested in people’s favorite tv shows, houses, or where they were going on vacation, but when you're just fighting for the courage to keep living each day, all of that stuff seems so trivial. I had canned answers for when people asked me how I was and what was new. “Great! You know, the usual.” They didn't have to know that “usual” meant I was throwing up all last night, and just sold my bedroom furniture to pay for another blood test. When I look back, I call those the “dark years” but God used that time to do a work in me that I wouldn’t trade for anything. He taught me how to love myself, and others unconditionally, and not base that love on performance. I learned to watch my confession, to never let sickness define me, and to be careful about who I told about my situation, because of the power of their spoken words as well. Healing confession audios helped me speak healing over my life, and I really learned how to renew my mind on the word and pray continually. Most of all, I died to myself. I finally got to the point where I had nothing left and gave God my ashes to do with what He wanted. In January 2014, my husband and I were asked to host a Chief Research Scientist at a conference. We knew this was not by coincidence, so I seized the opportunity to ask him questions. He took a special interest in my case and told me to send him the results for the tests I ordered, then he put me on a special diet to correct the imbalances. I saw drastic results which gave me the courage to start searching for a doctor that could help me put all of the pieces together. I was passed around a bit after Doctors learned of the complexity of my case. I was finally referred to an Integrative MD who did an exam, ran some tests, and then told me I was the poster child for traumatic brain injury (TBI) and post concussion syndrome. I was confused at first, but started to think of what could have caused a TBI. There was that time as a toddler, I slipped through a railing at the top of a staircase. I also had multiple falls on my head while participating in school sports, but I never thought they were a big deal. I didn't know a choking incident I had in 7th grade, likely caused a hypoxic injury, depriving my brain of oxygen. Then there was that time I was hit by a car and my head smashed through the windshield. I counted up over 7 different motor vehicle accidents since the age of 10, from fender benders in traffic, to being hit by other vehicles at about 60 mph. By now my Doctor was just shaking his head. It wasn’t until I matched these incidents in my life to my medical and school records that it all made sense, and special imaging scans later revealed evidence of repeated head trauma similar to that of an NFL player or Combat Veteran. It's crazy how we can totally overlook the lasting effects that head trauma can bring to our health, after all, our brains are the control center for every system in our body. I was so relieved to finally know what I was fighting and to be diagnosed by a doctor that believed in neuroplasticity and the brain’s ability to heal. Since then, my journey has been filled with cutting edge research, testing, therapies, special diets, supplementation, and most importantly, seeking wisdom from God so that He remains the orchestrater of it all. I'm still learning how to keep the balance of spirit, soul, and body. I've found it's like rowing a boat. One oar is working on my mind (soul), and the other is guiding how I physically take care of my brain and body. When I find myself spinning in circles, it’s usually because I only have one oar in the water. And no matter how well I row both, I'll be sinking fast if there are holes in my boat, which I liken to my spiritual foundation. I am also learning to keep dying to self, even as life gets good. It’s amazing how easy it was to give God my life at the bottom of a pit. It's even more fascinating how many times I have to fall on my face in order to learn how to stop taking it back every time I feel better. With selfishness comes fear and confusion, blocking us from living God's purpose for our lives, but I've heard, “it's hard for the enemy to scare a dead woman.” ...and I think I am finally getting the hang of learning how to intentionally rest. Did you know that laying around and worrying about how all of your problems are going to be solved isn’t rest? Because of the nature of Neuroplasticity, it is very important for me to be diligent and active, doing the things I need to do to heal, but then I can also find myself stressing over decisions, my next treatment, or wondering where the money is going to come from. It takes discipline to intentionally shift my focus to the many miracles that God has done so far in my life and will continue to do. Even the setbacks have always led to wisdom that has allowed me to help more people. I can easily grow weary if I try to control everything or focus on how long the journey has been, but every time that God connects me with someone who relates to a certain chapter of my story, I am reminded to trust Him through it all.

Trying to explain post brain injury symptoms is like trying to describe the smell of the color 9. It’s nearly impossible and chances are, everyone involved will end up confused. I have to reassure my husband and doctors that it’s okay if they don’t completely understand. In fact, I live with them everyday, and I still don’t understand all of them, so how should they? I don’t believe in dwelling on the negative effects of any illness, in fact there will be those who know me that will read this blog and are very surprised, because they have rarely ever or never heard me mention my symptoms at all. The intentions for me not speaking negative in many cases might be two fold. 1 – I am disciplined, I believe that every word I speak has power in my life to either bring sickness or healing both to my body and to others and I simply choose to speak life. 2 – I am saving mental energy, It is way easier to pretend I am feeling great than to try to explain to you why I’m not and lose control of the conversation. Most of us have learned to just not talk about what we are going through. That can be a good thing, because it takes our focus off of our pain, but it can also be a dangerous thing because we can easily slide into a dark place scared and alone with little resources or support. Being be able to talk to another person who “gets it” or hear a story from someone who has walked a similar journey can be extremely powerful to those of us affected by brain injury. Likewise, it can be very eye opening to a family member, friend, or doctor who is trying their best to understand what it’s like. Many times just hearing the same exact descriptions from another person validate that we are not weak, lazy, or crazy, and also help us rest assured that we are not the only ones. When asking some of my fellow warriors what they would love to see me post about in this blog, there was an overwhelming response of those asking me to communicate to people what it’s like to fight this battle every single day of our lives. Forgive me for the raw description, but this is the best way I know how to paint the picture. In high school, I had a friend who often did drugs before school. She was very good at hiding it from teachers and could act somewhat normal in the short time that she had to speak to them. It was only those of us who knew her very well that could tell if she was “in a different state of mind.” She may have done or said some quirky things, but on the outside she looked fairly normal. However, regardless of what she looked like to us, her view of the world and everything she was experiencing at the time was anything but normal. Although that is easier said than done, I will say, that if you tasted what one day was like, you would be less aggravated by their quirks and more amazed at their strength.

I battled an unusual amount of sickness as a young child. I guess, I was what you would call the “sick kid” of the family. My first childhood memory is me throwing up all night and my second is being rushed to the hospital for breathing treatments. The bathroom was often a steam room for me sleep in. There was always something going on with me, but I was determined to not let it slow me down. I was always on the honor roll and in the accelerated programs at school. I was constantly looking for the next challenge and thriving on adventure, climbing on and jumping off of just about everything. After seeing how I taught myself to do a back flip, and coming home to me “vaulting” over the living room couch, my mom quickly enrolled me into gymnastics classes. I had found my first love, and the gym quickly became my second home. I started competitive training right away and won my first state championship within a year. There were many neurological symptoms and cognitive issues during my childhood that I go into more in the unabridged version of my story. They seemed to progress as I got older and went into junior high and high school. I didn’t think they went well with my “tough girl” athletic persona, so I kept most of them to myself and would just push through them the best I could. It was hard because at a young age I could tell that something was different about me and for some reason, I physically could not handle the level of training that my talent had brought me to. I tried to “will through it” the best I could but by my sophomore year in high school, we decided for me to stop training at the intense club level and instead join the varsity team at school, which was more laid back and proved to be less stressful on my body. This also opened up the opportunity for me to join the track team where my pole vaulting days began. My coach asked if I wanted to give it a try at a pre-season meet. He just told me to go for it, and I ended up breaking the school record. It takes someone a little crazy to slingshot themselves into the air with a fiberglass pole, and I just happened to be that person. It was exactly the adrenaline rush I was looking for, and I was totally hooked. Neurological and digestive symptoms grew worse in highschool and really started to affect every area of my life by the time senior year was over. I would randomly throw up in the middle of the night. My arms and legs would go numb during practice, and I would stop in the middle of my routines as if I forgot how to do them. I would suddenly lose my depth perception and awareness in space and I started seeing stars at least once every gymnastics practice. These are just weird things to a teenage athlete, so I had no idea what to do except for push through them like I had always done. Due to reading and attention difficulties, I stopped taking all the higher honors classes and started to take the ones that offered an easy “A.” Rather than tell anyone that something was wrong, I just made it seem like I was bored and wanted to focus more on athletics. I often just didn’t feel right, but could not put a finger on it. It just seemed like I pushed myself too hard, and my body refused to keep up with me anymore. Everyone expected me to compete at the collegiate level, but I knew I wouldn’t be able to physically handle the training or the classes at a University, and I made the tough (and expensive) decision to give up athletic scholarships to go to a private school for fashion design. I had been sewing since the age of 5 and whenever I wasn’t in the gym, I was usually designing my own clothes. So I guess you could say I gave up one passion for another. I thought this would alleviate my health issues, but instead, it just seemed to change them. Along came depression and all sorts of emotional dysregulation. I had always been challenged with physical illness and had bouts of anxiety as a young child but depression was a new animal. I would have never admitted to it at the time though because I was “too tough” to be depressed. I thought I was just going through a personality change because I was away from home for the first time. I avoided the pain by losing myself in work, school, and partying. I was doing anything just to try to “feel good” again. At one point I was working 3 jobs while taking 16 credit hours and still finding time to go out with friends. I was in constant overdrive and felt like super woman for a couple years until all the sudden my health plummeted. Vomiting, chronic pain, sleep disorder, hormonal imbalance, headaches. It felt like my brain and body had a mind of their own and were self destructing with no rhyme or reason. I finally saught out medical help. Doctors ran tests and put me on a lot of different meds, but they seemed to just complicate my symptoms instead of make anything better. When no answers were found they blamed it on anxiety and stress. I did have some recovery after college was over. Symptoms were more manageable and I was able to start competing recreationally in the sports I had loved so much while working in my new career as a fashion designer. My husband and I were newly married, just bought a house, and started a marketing business together on the side of our budding careers. Things were looking really good for the future. But in 2010, I started to grow very sick again. I began to question if it was stress related and maybe I was just doing too much. I turned into a complete health nut, I de-stressed my life, researched every healthy living book I could get my hands on, and radically changed my diet and lifestyle. But no matter what I did, I just got worse. It felt like my brain and body were completely shutting down on me. Just trying to live a normal life became a huge struggle. I was diagnosed with more disorders and syndromes than I can even name, but no one could pinpoint where they were coming from. Some doctors thought it was an autoimmune disorder, some thought it was an infection deep in my tissues, and some mentioned fibromyalgia and epstein-barr. I went through testing for things like chronic lymes disease, celiac, and leaky gut, but most testing would come back negative or unclear and I knew I never fit the perfect description for any specific diagnosis. Instead, it was like I had a little bit of everything. I was told to just accept that I had a degenerative disease that was incurable, and all I could do was just take medication to cope with the symptoms. I ran into some great doctors who really wanted to help but felt it was out of their specialty, but many others were just quick to write me a prescription or hand me drug samples and move on to the next patient. But I didn’t want more drugs. I wanted answers. I wanted to know why my body wasn’t working anymore so I could find out how to fix it. By this time, I couldn’t even get out of bed on my own strength to go to work. My husband would come home on his lunch break to pick me up out of bed and massage my arms and legs until I could move and walk around. I’d walk in 3 hours late to work like everything was fine and never told anyone what was going on. I’d only have about 2 hours a day that I could function somewhat normally so eventually, we made the decision for me to come home and try to just work in our home based business on my own schedule. I still had a passionate and driven spirit and would fight so hard to push through and do everything I could in our business, but my body fought back even harder. I was collapsing multiple times per day for 15-45 minutes at a time. It was like someone just pulled the power plug on my entire body, and I went into a “spell” where I couldn’t move or talk. I would fall asleep doing daily tasks and was diagnosed with narcolepsy after some testing. I could only drive for short familiar trips, and even then I needed a gps to remind me where to go. It’s impossible to name every symptom. I go into them more in “My Story Unabridged.” There were digestive problems, sleep disorder, dizziness, loss of balance, auditory and visual processing difficulties, attention and memory problems, stabbing pains in my head, partial seizures, arthritic pain, and the list goes on. The fatigue was unbearable, and every day was like waking up with a combination of a hangover and the flu. Any kind of activity made me feel like I was drunk or in a dream, and the more I pushed myself the worse it got. I would try to work from home in our business or do chores around the house, but I’d end up just getting lost walking around my house aimlessly. By the time I remembered where I was or what task I was trying to do, I would run out of breath and have to sit and take a break. Doctors would sometimes bring up depression or anxiety, because I had all the physical aspects, like fatigue, sleep issues, heart palpitations, difficulty breathing, etc, but I didn’t recognize it as such because unlike in the past, I didn’t particularly feel sad or fearful. In fact, I realized one day that I didn’t feel much of any specific emotions anymore. I remembered how things used to make me feel happy, sad, scared, or angry, but now, I felt more like a robot than a human being. It’s almost as if my body no longer had the energy to even produce emotions. Sometimes after a collapsing spell, I would have a rush of emotion and cry, but it was more of just a random physical feeling that happened as my body was coming back to life. Often a physical sensation of hopelessness or a complete lack of peace flooded me. It was like wave that came over me for few seconds up to a few hours and was triggered by things like trying to walk in a busy grocery store, or physical pain such as a stomach ache. I knew that it was just another dysregulation in my body and just to hold on because it would pass eventually. Everything my body was supposed to naturally regulate like heart rate, breathing, digestion, body temperature, etc. was all over the place. There was no normal. One minute I was in a frantic fight or flight mode bouncing around everywhere, and the next minute, I didn’t even have the strength to sit up. I started to live what felt like a double life. I rarely left my house but a few times a week for church, medical appts and our weekly business meeting. I would appear healthy and high energy for the most part while my body was in fight or flight mode, but a couple hours in public would take days to recover from. I would try so hard to act “normal” when I was with other people and I made sure to post a fun picture on facebook whenever I could so my friends and family wouldn’t worry about me. These days you can just post a few pictures on social media that look like you are having fun and everyone thinks that is what your life looks like all the time. Those closest to me knew that something was going on. It was impossible to hide everything, but only my husband saw what I was facing on a daily basis, and I worked hard to keep it that way. These two pictures were taken in the same afternoon within hours of each other. It’s amazing what hair makeup and a smile can do. When you live the life of prolonged chronic illness you can become a master at looking “not sick” meanwhile the constant pain and suffering inside is almost to much to bare. “Sometimes it’s just easier to act like everything is fine than to try to explain to someone why it’s not.” Pride had a lot to do with it. I never wanted anyone to think I was weak or feel sorry for me. I also believe in the power of words and the last thing I wanted was to speak negative things over myself or have others speak negatively about my situation. I also didn’t want people to think I was trying to exaggerate my problems to get attention. I believe anyone fighting through chronic illness can relate to the fact that sometimes it’s just easier to act like everything is fine than try to explain to someone why it’s not. Besides, it was nice to be able to be who I wanted to be and live the life I wanted if even just for a short moment. Sometimes on a really good day, with enough distractions, I could almost forget that I was sick for a short time. Through it all, I oddly still had a great sense of humor whenever I had the energy for it, and my husband and I went out of our way to laugh as much as we could. It was the best way we knew how to soften the blows of the realities we were facing, and he said it was the only time he could see a “real” smile on my face. It’s not that I never smiled, in fact, I had my “game face” perfected to the point that most people around me never knew that something was going on, but he could tell the difference between the smile that I wore through my pain to be courteous and the effortless one he could draw out of me with his silly jokes. All my life I was known as a high achiever and a hard worker, always thriving on overcoming challenges and solving problems. I had started out so full of faith that I would be healed and that God would use my story to help others. But as the years passed by, and I grew worse instead of better, I began to raise a white flag. I did everything I knew to do, but for some reason it wasn’t enough. I reached a point in my journey where I didn’t necessarily want to die but I didn’t feel like I had the strength to keep living. I could no longer contribute to our income and my medical bills were multiplying. I felt like a helpless burden and I was sorry for my husband that he ever married me. Though he went out of his way to make sure I never felt guilty it was still a battle to not think about all the things he could have if I were gone. It seemed that everything I had ever been good at or proud of was taken from me. Everything I once used to define who I was as a person dissolved until I had nothing left. Sometimes it takes losing everything for us to finally surrender the ashes we have left to God so that He can finally do what He wanted to all along. “She rises while it is yet night” One day day at church, we had a guest speaker and she referenced Proverbs 31:15. “She rises while it is yet night.” I knew this was an encouragement to me to reignite the pilot light of hope and start walking in faith again, and that even if I was walking in the dark, God would lead me, and He did. I was soon lead to the right testing and the right doctors in the most amazing way, that I couldn’t have orchestrated on my own. I had some doctors along the way that I could tell, thought my illness was in my head, but this new doctor I was referred to, said it was in my brain. I wasn’t sure what to make of it, but he told me that based on my symptoms and test results, I was the poster child for traumatic brain injury and post concussion syndrome. But I never had a brain injury that I knew of. I mean I had a lot of crazy things happen in my life, but I could always walk and talk after them, so I didn’t think of them as a brain injuries. It wasn’t until I researched my medical records, and did a timeline of the incidents in my life that I realized that he was right. When I was 16 months old I slipped through the railing at the top of a staircase and fell straight down nearly a full story. No one saw exactly how I landed but a huge black eye revealed an impact to my head. I was in multiple vehicle accidents as a child. The one that I believe was most significant, was on my tenth birthday when a car ran a red light and hit us. My mom was driving and my sister and I were in the back seat. This was directly followed by a fall to my head in gymnastics when I was first learning a back tuck. This didn’t seem to out of the ordinary at the time. In fact, I had fallen on or hit my head numerous times whether in sports or just being my adventurous self. I ended up in the ER a few times but mostly just when we thought I needed stitches, I remember blacking out and getting my bell rung a quite a bit, especially in athletics, but there wasn’t a large awareness of concussions back then so no one thought much of them. We sure didn’t think that they would be causing my symptoms. It was only after looking closely at the timing of some of the major incidents and the changes that happened in my health and school work that we realized the effects they had on me. I almost choked to death in 7th grade. I fell unconscious from the lack of oxygen and someone dragged me out of the bathroom where I fell and resuscitated me. I didn’t know that hypoxia could cause what is called an aquired brain injury due to lack of oxygen to the brain. So when more neurological changes happened, we didn’t think of it as being a possible cause. In college, I was hit by a car when I was walking. I was tossed in the air and my head and shoulder smashed through the windshield. Then when the driver stopped I toppled back onto the street. Everyone said I was lucky to be alive. After being released from the hospital and taken off the drugs, I figured if I could still walk and talk I must be fine. But I wasn’t, things got worse that year and I didn’t know it was from the accident. 2 years later I was in another high speed accident. This one was my fault and I believe the result of my illness I was already dealing with. I don’t remember much except for hitting the sidewall of the highway multiple times at about 65mph and totaling my car. Of course I was shook up, but I was high on adrenaline. I even went to work that night so I thought I was okay. But in the months following I grew even more sick than I already was and had no idea it was related. A few years later when I had started to feel better. I was pole vaulting in a collegiate track meet and my pole broke sending me headfirst into the box area in between the mats, where you plant the pole. I was in pain and a bit shook up but I just got up grabbed another pole and took another attempt… A year after that, I was hit by a drunk driver that ran a redlight going about 60 mph. The same year my illness took a turn for the worst. August 2014 was when I finally received the correct diagnosis. I can’t say of all things, I expected to be told I had brain damage, and I can’t say that I wanted to accept it at first, but it was such a blessing that I was diagnosed by a doctor who was well educated on neuroplasticity and the brain’s way of healing. He didn’t give me a doom and gloom diagnosis like I was used to. Instead, he was quick to show me some new cutting edge treatments that are available to help. A few months later, I traveled to a brain center in North Carolina for a 2 week brain injury rehabilitation program. It turns out all those weird symptoms that made my former doctors look at me funny were actually common post brain injury concerns. These doctors already knew them by name, and had extensive testing for them. Many times they could even tell me what was happening inside my brain to cause the symptoms and how we can create new neural pathways by retraining my brain to work properly again. I can’t even describe the way it felt to finally know what I was fighting and have a plan to overcome it. It felt like I started a whole new life, but after coming back home from the brain center, I knew it was going to be just the beginning of long road of recovery. The healing process has been quite a journey so far. There is no magic pill or surgery. There is no expected timelines or sure outcomes. It takes a lot of hard work, time, patience and a ton of financial sacrifice. So far, I’ve experienced really exciting breakthroughs and extremely tough challenges. But I know every penny and every single bit of blood sweat and tears is going to be worth it if I can help just one person have hope for a better tomorrow.

Dr. Amen is a #1  New York Times  best-selling author,double board-certified psychiatrist, professor and brain health expert. He is one of America’s leading psychiatrists and brain health experts and has authored or coauthored 70 professional articles and more than 30 books, including  New York Times  mega-bestseller  Change Your Brain, Change Your Life . I have been a patient at one of Dr. Amen’s Clinics and done the SPECT Imaging he talks about in the following video. I have also been helped greatly by reading his books and other resources, and have successfully used products from his supplement line BrainMD.

This past Sunday, we had Andrew Kubala as a guest speaker at our church. I was excited to see him preach, because I have been studying his teachings over and over the past couple years. During worship, I cried out to God and said, “I know you’ve told me Your plan for how You’re healing me and I am thankful that You have been true to Your word. I have come so far already, but can You do something tonight God? I know I am healed. I know it’s already promised and I am walking in it and seeing Your wonders everyday, but can You just move in some special way tonight?” Andrew’s message was on point, “Practice what you Preach.” It’s funny how in the midst of me coaching so many people on how they can walk in healing, I can get complacent with all the progress I’ve made and start to get lazy in my own fight for full and total restoration. The downside of knowing in your heart and mind that your healing is a done deal and watching it play out in the natural, is that it can be all too easy to rest on your laurels and stop warring in the spirit like you once did. Andrew’s Sunday message encouraged me to get just as relentless spiritually as I was years ago, when I wasn’t even able to get out of bed on my own strength. After the message, Andrew said he felt there were ladies in the room that were in multiple vehicle accidents – and went on to say something about “for someone the accidents possibly being at least 5 or so years ago.” My friends who knew my story turned to look at me as I myself realized who he was talking about. I have never been so specifically called down to the front before especially by someone from halfway around the world who knew nothing about me or my story. Andrew asked me a little about the accidents and what I’ve been dealing with because of them. I told him about my brain injuries and the things like chronic pain, both physical and emotional, that comes with them. He asked me what I would like him to pray for, and of course, I said “my brain.” He prayed for my brain for a bit and then touched my back and said he felt that God told him that there is a lot going on with a curvature or something in my spine, especially in my lower back, and I have been seeing someone like maybe a chiropractor or someone to try to help it. As he and everyone else in the service prayed, I felt a warm sensation enter my back and the power of God was so overwhelming in that moment, I have yet to be able to put the experience into words. A few minutes later, Andrew asked if all the back issues were true, and I told him about the problems with scoliosis, lordosis, and degenerative and bulging discs and that I had been seeing doctors for those issues since I was a little girl. Although the doctors, therapists, and I trained my posture to noticeably improve over the years and I wasn’t referred to as “the girl with the back” anymore, the painful misalignments still remained. I never thought to ask for healing for these issues, because they’ve always just been there and taken a back seat to my more serious brain injuries. He, without me telling him any of these details, had put his hand right in the same spot that the degenerative and bulging discs were, and I have felt this warm, almost burning sensation and movement ever since. I know this sounds crazy, but yesterday and today, that feeling and movement has traveled up my back and to my ribs that had been noticeably crooked since I can remember. I believe that God is doing a miracle right now in my spine that years of chiropractic, physical therapy, and back braces have not been able to budge. A miracle that I never even thought to ask for, with an ailment that I got complacent with having, because I learned to tolerate the pain. I believe the prayer of faith that was lifted up Sunday night has caused not only an instant miracle to begin to take place, but so many breakthroughs in the unseen that I will continue to watch come to fruition in the natural before my eyes. So many people think the only miracles that happen are the ones you can see right away; but I’ve read too much of my Bible and seen too many of my own miracles already in my healing to believe that. When Jesus cursed the fig tree, a power was released and a process started immediately in that tree. The disciples didn’t see the noticeable evidence until they came back the next day to see it withered. (Mark 11:12-25) Peter (commonly the first to believe) said to Jesus, “Rabbi, look! The fig tree which You cursed has withered!” I believe in that moment, all the disciples had the choice to decide how they believed it really happened. I know for a fact that there was a shift Sunday night, both for my spine and brain healing. Something connected. A door opened somewhere. A switch turned on in my body. I cannot wait to see the curtain pulled back and share the evidence. Just the simple fact that God had Andrew call me out like that and that he knew to pray for something so significant that I didn’t even mention, gave both Brendan and me a renewed confirmation that God sees us and our faith; and that He isn’t nearly as interested in meeting our expectations for healing as He is in exceeding them many times over. “Now to Him who is able to do exceedingly abundantly above all that we ask or think, according to the power that works in us.” Ephesians 3:20

A couple of months ago I was having a particularly hard weekend. I was frustrated with the fight and had so many questions about the future. It felt like my healing was placed on hold. Our next step for my treatment was getting a SPECT scan and evaluation at one of Dr. Daniel Amen’s clinics in Washington DC. We knew that it would help us get an idea of where my brain function was and that the scan results would tell us what would be the best treatment to help me get to where I want to be. The only thing stopping us was the fact that the SPECT scan would cost $3900 plus travel expenses. I had given an offering, believing in faith for the money to get it done. There were so many ways that I thought we would raise it, but nothing seemed to be working out. In fact, things were looking much worse than when I gave the offering in the first place. Brendan wanted to cheer me up by going to dinner, but since I can only tolerate outdoor restaurants and it was storming, we were out of options. There was, however, a new pizza place that had opened in town that we thought would be slow and quiet. This was a big deal b/c we rarely ever go out to eat simply b/c we can’t bring ourselves to pay that much for food when we could be paying that money toward medical expenses. The restaurant proved to be anything but sensory friendly, even with my acoustic filters in. Between the TVs, crashing silverware and crowd noise, my brain was spinning. By the time we got seated, I couldn’t even read the menu, or talk to the waitress. Brendan saw what was happening to me, and took control of the situation like he’s done so many times before. He pointed to the menu at the item he knew I would probably want, signaling for my confirmation and I nodded. He helped me up and told me to go to the car, and that he would order to go for us. Inside the car and still soaked by the rain, I sat and cried while watching all the happy couples inside eating and enjoying their dates. I thought about how we just wasted $20 that we could have put toward bills. I was frustrated for Brendan that he can’t just have a normal wife. All I could do was cry out to God… When!? When am I going to be all better? How much longer do I have to fight? How much longer do I have to sit out and watching other people get to live? Immediately, my inner coach stepped in and I started to talk myself out of the pity party. Think of how many people have it worse than you, Liz. Look at the blessings that you have been given. Look at how far you’ve come. A few years ago you were in bed for days at a time, and could barely close your eyes without falling over. These moments always seem to hang in the balance of letting myself be vulnerable before God and making sure I don’t go down a path of ungratefulness. I just wanted to know that everything would be okay. I wanted to know that although He seemed far away at the moment, God still had my back. Just as I started to calm down, Brendan opened the car door and said, “Wow, I have never seen a rainbow like that!” I looked out my window and saw the biggest rainbow I had ever seen, stretching right across the parking lot. I just took that in faith as a sign that God was telling me to trust him that everything was indeed going to be okay. That night we watched the movie, “Miracles from Heaven”, and it spurred so many emotions that I just had to let surface. So many of us affected by TBI or any other chronic illness can watch that movie and relate to the little girl who is fighting for her health for so long. We feel what she felt when she had to sit out and watch everyone else live their life. We understand her all too well when she said she wasn’t afraid of dying anymore. It makes sense to us that she told God that she didn’t want to come back to her earthly life if it meant she still had to be sick. Brendan, on the other hand, like so many spouses and family members would, related to the mom. Fighting for her daughter in the natural, but letting her faith in God’s healing power waiver. At the end of the movie, seeing her breakthrough after all that she suffered and how God used her story to bring hope to so many was like a second rainbow to the both of us. We had waited for that movie to come to DVD for quite a while and I believe it was the perfect time that we needed to see it. The next morning, Brendan woke me up to tell me that we had a surprise $1600 come in. Later that night, I had a feeling that something was coming in the mail and sure enough I had two checks from my insurance company. Months ago, I had called them to see if they would reimburse for some of my last trip to the brain center. The lady on the phone said it didn’t look like it, but I sent the request in by mail anyway. Lo and behold, they did reimburse me $1400, and it finally came in the mail that day! In addition, a friend sent me an email asking me if I had ever heard of the Amen Clinics, she said that she is a patient there and they would give me a $400 friends and family discount if I mentioned her. With all of these surprise (but expected) blessings, plus the $1000 I had already saved, we were bound for DC! Sometimes it’s so hard to stay in faith when things aren’t working out like you would expect. Sometimes it seems like God is taking forever! I believe He is not as interested in living up to our expectations as He is in going over and above our expectations in a way that we have no choice but to give Him all the glory.

A common symptom of brain injury is autonomic nervous system dysfunction or “dysautonomia.” Your brain stem is the control center for the automatic things like your heart rate, breathing, blood pressure, digestion, perspiration, etc and is very vulnerable to injury. Dysautonomia can basically feel like all your bodily functions are “out of control” or “have a mind of their own”. A common syndrome is POTS or Postural Orthostatic Tachycardia Syndrome where your heart rate increases dramatically (over 30bpm) when you are in a standing position vs sitting or laying down. Someone with dysautonomia symptoms often have huge fluctuations in their heart rate and blood pressure while just trying to do simple daily activities. I remember the first time I went to a doctor that understood brain injury. He took my heart rate sitting down and then again standing up. I was surprised to see the huge 40bpm difference. This explained why I would often “black out” when I stood up. I then started to wear a heart monitor daily and the fluctuation was so high that I thought it was broken until I put it on my husband for a day and his readings barely budged. Another common symptom of dysautonomia is Gastroparesis where the stomach doesn’t empty properly. I suffered from severe gastroparesis after a car accident in 2006. I would vomit things that I knew I didn’t eat that day. My doctor performed an endoscopy where he found there was still food in my stomach from the day before. There wasn’t a large awareness of dysautonomia back then so my doc couldn’t explain why this was happening. Now there are some doctors, especially neurologists, who are aware of dysautonomia, but many still don’t know that it is commonly caused by brain injury from concussions and also reported to be a common problem after the Gardisil vaccine which I had also been talked into getting before I knew better. So far my biggest improvements through therapies have been in my breathing, blood pressure, digestion, sweating, and heart rate. When I went to see a certain specialist for this condition, they told me that I wouldn’t get better on my own and would have to just take steroids to manage the symptoms long term. I knew better though and so did my other Doctors. As my brain has healed from the many therapies that I’ve done, my symptoms have greatly reduced. It’s hard to tell what “did the trick” but I’ve noticed that some of the most powerful therapies for my dysautonomia symptoms have been anything that helps activate the parasympathetic nervous system and stimulate the vagus nerve. These activities have included breathing exercises, electric stimulation like Fisher Wallace and SSEP, throat activations like humming and gargling, Christian meditation and prayer, Wholetones music, etc.

This is much more than just a hearing test. A thorough auditory processing evaluation will not just test your hearing ability and sensitivity, it will also test the ability for your brain to process what you are hearing as well. Let me start with the basics. Auditory Processing, like many other functions in your body, has 2 parts that have to work together. The hardware function (sound traveling through your ears and ear canals) and the software function (how your brain recognizes and interprets the sounds that made it into your ears). Auditory problems can be an issue of the ear itself, but in the case of someone with brain injury, ptsd, autism, aspergers, etc, the problem more than likely lies with how the brain is processing the information that the ear is sending in from the world around them. Many times, people with brain challenges will pass a standard hearing test. In fact, most have too good of hearing. However, because many of us with brain challenges don’t filter sounds like a normal person, we hear more than we should – this is why we can be so sensitive to sound in general. Just a warning…. if you go for the evaluation, your insurance may only cover the standard hearing part of the test and you may have to pay for the more important “auditory processing evaluation” part of this test out-of-pocket. Surprise Surprise! However, even with my insurance only covering a portion, it was still under $150, which is nothing compared to a lot of other testing I have done in the past. I was referred to a doctor of audiology at a large Ear, Nose, and Throat (ENT) office for my evaluation and was very pleased with her. She was not only familiar with Traumatic Brain Injury (TBI) through her profession, but also had personal experience because her sister was still rehabilitating from a brain injury due to an accident that happened a couple years prior. It is always a breath of fresh air when we can talk to a professional who is actually familiar with TBI. They ask the right questions, and our answers that include odd descriptions of our peculiar symptoms actually make sense to them. After going over my history and current challenges, Dr. V had me go into a soundproof booth. It was glorious! Anyone with hyperacusis, or any sensory processing challenges, can appreciate the instant calm that happens in our brains when we are able to escape the hostile sounds of a public building (especially a doctor’s office exam room fully equipped with echoing tile floors, florescent lighting, and forced air vent). This was my favorite part of the testing. I never wanted to leave this “safe haven” once I went into the booth. In fact, after the testing was completed, Dr. V let me stay in the soundproof booth for our closing conversation when she realized the difference it made in my ability to communicate. Okay, back to the testing. Once inside the booth, Dr. V inserted special earphones into my ears and then exited the booth to sit down at her desk on the other side of a window that I was facing. Other than the initial startle whenever her voice or the recording came over the earphones, I was quite comfortable. She even lowered the volume of her microphone to me to ease the discomfort. This is an overview of what my evaluation consisted of. A normal hearing test – The typical “listen for the beep and push the button when you hear it” routine. I performed within normal range for this test in both ears, which wasn’t surprising. Speech reception – A single syllable word was presented and I repeated it. I also performed within the normal range for this test in both ears. Speech in noise test – Single syllable words were presented in the presence of background noise. I was to repeat back all the words that I heard. I tested within normal range for my right ear but my left ear showed a mild impairment. Pitch Pattern Sequence Test – 3 tone bursts were presented in random orders of high and low pitched tones. I was to repeat back the order by stating “high-high-low” or “low-high-low” or “low-high-low,” etc. The struggle for me with this one was putting the tones into the words high or low. Because I was so slow at using words to describe the tones, she let me just hum them as I heard them. I ended up scoring at 80%, which was within the normal range. This showed that I heard the tones well and could process the order but the abnormal part of the result was the cognitive struggle of being unable to describe the tones with the words high and low and having to hum them. Staggered Spondaic Words Test – A series of 4 words are presented of which the 2nd and 3rd are presented at the same time in the opposite ear, and I had to repeat them. This test was a doozy. My initial reaction after hearing the first set of words was a crying spell. Right away, tears were flowing as if I had no control over it. Immediately, I knew that this was the same feeling I get in busy public places. The urgent need to cry and throw up at the same time. I apologized for my episode – Dr. V explained that it is not out of the ordinary for TBI patients to have that reaction because a person’s auditory processing is directly tied to their limbic system and can cause that automatic reaction when overwhelmed. I did get through a few of them but had to stop the testing early because I felt sick from it. We took a break and when I got up to go to the bathroom, I realized how “drunk” I had gotten from the testing. This explains a lot of my struggles in environments where there is noise, especially conversation noise coming in on both sides. Dichotic Digits test – I was presented with 4 numbers at the same time and had to repeat them back in any order. We had to take many breaks because of the overwhelming stimulation but I did get through this one. I even scored a 90% for accuracy which was within normal limits for my age. These two tests reflected one thing I already knew about myself – I do so much better with numbers than words. Loudness discomfort levels – This was a testing of different tones to determine at what level discomfort occurred. This test revealed my hyperacusis (noise sensitivity). The resulting diagnosis was hyperacusis, auditory processing deficits, and difficulty with auditory memory and auditory decoding, as well as difficulty with cognitive word finding skills. The treatment recommendations were: Referral to a speech language pathologist for evaluation and therapies to include noise desensitization, auditory memory and decoding, and cognitive word finding. Memory training and compensatory strategies for auditory memory such as imposing delays, chunking, or 4 step rehearsal. Some apps that Dr. V suggested for at-home therapy are: Sleep Mask Sleep Mask is a white noise app that can be used as a sleep-aid or distraction blocker. It produces high quality white, pink, and brown noise sounds as well as some variations of these. I only found this one for Apple, so a cool Android app that’s similar would be Noise Machine. If you are like me and can’t stand white noise I think you might appreciate pink or brown noise. Try them all and see what gives you the best feeling of calm. Auditory Processing Studio Auditory Processing Studio was created by a certified speech and language pathologist for adults and children ages 7 and up who exhibit Central Auditory Processing Disorder or other auditory processing disorders. This research-based app implements the bottom-top approach to treatment of auditory processing disorders and focuses on improving auditory processing through auditory discrimination, auditory closure, and phonological awareness activities. Users can also introduce background noise to help children or adults practice their listening skills in a noisy environment. It is available on Apple for 29.99 The closest Android app that I could find for this was Auditory Workout for 18.99 which is also mentioned below. If you know of one that is closer to it. Please comment below. Sound Match Sound Match is a unique twist of the classic memory game – it challenges your ears, not the eyes. Remember the sounds and put them in pairs. Available for Apple and Android devices and FREE EASe Listening Therapy EASe was studied by researchers at Brenau university in 2012 and found effective in reducing auditory hypersensitivity in children with sensory processing disorder. The EASe Listening Therapy app for iPhone, iPod touch and iPad for 39.99 was developed for children with autism and other sensory processing disorders (SPD), who often respond to noise with exaggerated reactions and behavioral or learning issues. I have yet to find an Android app quite like this one so please comment below if you know of one. Auditory Workout Auditory Workout was created by a certified speech and language pathologist for students ages 4–10 who exhibit auditory processing disorders or other related disorders (e.g., receptive language disorder or autism). Auditory Workout is research-based and focuses on improving auditory attention and memory and auditory processing of verbal directions. This engaging, colorful app includes hundreds of audio instructions and the feature that allows users to set background noise (classroom noise). It is available for 18.99 on Android and 24.99 on Apple Comprehension Aphasia The Comprehension Aphasia app was created by a certified speech and language pathologist for adults and children, and it focuses on auditory comprehension of increasingly longer and complex yes-no- questions and directions with the ability to turn on background noise. The Comprehension Aphasia app can be used by individuals who exhibit: Aphasia, secondary to brain injury such as stroke, Cognitive deficits such as decreased attention, Central Auditory Processing Disorder (CAPD), Receptive language disorders and Autism. It can be downloaded for 19.99 on both the Apple store and Google Play Store Follow Simon’s Music Simon will blink a light while buzzing a sound.Wait for him to finish and then click that same button. This way you watch the computer and follow the pattern sequence in the same order for as long as you can remember. It is the only game is appstore on the Simon Says concept having different level of difficulties. Available on Apple Store for free. This particular app doesn’t look like it is available on Android. There are many Simon Games on there though. Feel free to try them out and let me know what you think.

Can I just get real for a second? It’s been a busy couple of days for me. I was already pushed into a drunken fight or flight mode yesterday and by the time we made it to the grocery store this afternoon, I was in major survival mode. Using the cart as a walker was the only thing preventing a collapse in the middle of the store. When we got home, I could barely get myself out of the car to wobble to the couch, as my husband helped me to safety and put away all the groceries, pausing only to bring me a glass of water. Bless his amazing heart, he’s been through this drill too many times before. So why is it that not even 30 minutes after laying down, I already feel guilty for resting? Is it my “type A” mind annoyed with my injured brain that just can’t keep up? Is it society’s message that you “aren’t worthy of anything unless your busy” ringing in my ear? Is it the pressure of trying to live up to people’s expectation of me? After all, I look like a normal person on the outside, so I should be able to function like one. Right? Or is it the expectation I have for myself, to be incredibly strong, rising above everything to be everyone’s hero regardless of my current physical condition? Whatever the carnal reason, it all spiritually stems from a big ugly enemy called fear. Fear of what people think of me. Fear of what I think of myself. Fear that I am wasting precious time that I could be working toward my goals. And yes, even fear that my momentary pause in action is really stemming from a lack of faith. As much as that doesn’t even make sense, it doesn’t stop the thought from creeping in. Most of the time we associate faith with action and fear with inaction. After all, like many other people with a driver, hard-working temperament, one of my favorite Bible quotes is “faith without works is dead.” We tend to forget about the dozens of other verses that talk about resting and having peace as a reflection of faith and trusting in God. I understand that for many physically able people, the couch is a deadly comfort zone, and faith for them means getting up and making things happen. But for many, especially those of us walking out our healing, it can be just the opposite. In fact, it takes more faith to give your body a rest when it needs it, than it does to keep striving through the exhaustion for fear that you will lose something. Fear that you will lose ground in whatever you are trying to accomplish. Fear that you will lose God’s blessing. Fear that you will lose the respect of those around you, or even worse, fear of losing your own self respect. This type of action in fear vs. intentional resting in faith, could be the very thing setting us back in our healing instead of moving us forward. So I encourage you healing warriors to work hard, do your exercises, go for your treatment, strengthen your spirit, renew your mind, and stretch yourself when necessary, but balance it with intentional rest. Do your self image a favor and make resting a wise decision backed by faith, and not a forced period of recovery from your physical body failing you. You may have an iron will, but if you push it hard enough, your brain is going to make you rest on it’s own terms whether you like it or not. And believe me… I speak from an embarrassing amount of experience when I say that voluntarily kicking your feet up with a glass of iced tea for a while is much better than enduring an entire day on the couch, icing your head. Convince yourself that rest is sometimes the most productive thing that you can do in working toward your end goal, especially if that goal is a healed brain.

Did you know studies show that stretching helps you build lasting memory and may reduce your risk for Alzheimers ? It is also proven to reduce anxiety which helps you think more clearly in the moment . Stretching can also help another common symptom of TBI and ABI which is Dysautonomia and POTS “Stretching affects not only our muscle system but also our neurological system, which includes the operation of the brain. When you stretch, you lengthen some areas while relaxing others. The brain in turn regulates automatic functions such as heart rate and blood pressure. It secretes hormones, which act as chemical messengers to help insulin control, metabolism, mood and emotion.” Taken from the book “Stretching,” by Suzanne Martin #HealingatHome #Tips