Severe Challenge of Surviving a Brain Injury Without Diagnosis

Colliding Careers and Relationships after Brain Damage

By Gordon S. Johnson, Jr.

My brain injury occurred a year before going to law school. I was thrown from a car at expressway speed. Upon waking, I was surrounded by ambulance personnel. In the emergency room, I was assessed for a cervical injury. The test came back negative, so I was discharged. This occurred in 1975 when there was no CT scan. I wasn’t told I had a head injury, so I was never warned about what lied ahead.

I had not discovered the deficits in my brain until I had an MRI done 38 years later.

Shown here is MRI image of the author’s brain, showing a clear coup/contrecoup damage pattern.

If I’d known I had a brain injury, it may have held me back. I may have lost the confidence to go to law school.

Should I have been told? Of course. Did it change me? A picture of me now is probably what my high school history teacher would have predicted. Within a matter of weeks, I gave up my chosen profession, lost a relationship that may have ended in marriage, and was thrust into the depths of despair. Had I known I had a brain injury, I may have avoided these devastating consequences.

I graduated college at Northwestern University six weeks after my brain injury. I thought I was healthy, so I went off to start my career as a reporter at a small town newspaper in Leesburg, FL. The job was not beyond my previous ability. I had graduated from the Medill School of Journalism and was sports editor at the award-winning college paper the Daily Northwestern. Despite my credentials, I was unable to handle the pressure of deadline reporting and coming up with story ideas. On my second day on the job, I lost enough confidence to quit the job.

Surviving a Brain Injury Requires Loving Support

In the weeks between my car wreck and the end of my journalism career, I was what you could say was volatile. I was in a relationship with someone who had to take care of me and couldn’t understand my irrational jealousy and extraordinary dependency. If I had gotten a simple explanation of brain injury, I would have still been with her.

However, at the time where I needed to decide between her and a job, I chose the job.

Three months later, I had lost the main support in my life. I had no career, no girlfriend, no respect from my closest of friends. I was shunned from the Northwestern community. I had to deliver newspapers that didn’t contain my writing.

The thing that saved me from further deterioration was my motivation to take the LSATs. Studying for the exam gave me a goal and focus. My most significant deficits were in mood and not cognition, so I was able to do well on the test. Law school became possible. I was on a new path.

However, an acceptable score on the LSAT did not mean I had recovered. I still struggled with motivation, initiative, and relationships the following year. I still had challenges my first semester of law school. The discipline of law school and exercise gave me an accidental recovery to the point where a year and a half after my injury I was functioning at pre-injury levels.

Why Take a Chance on Accidental Recovery?

I believe that brain injury recovery should not be accidental. People with brain injury need the treatment. It would have saved my writing career and my most significant relationship. I would have had more hope. I would have had my support network in tact.

The most significant risk factor after brain injury is neurobehavioral problems and problems with mood. Suicide is a definitive risk factor. I got hope from the LSAT, but it was only just in time.

Head injury can change lives, but one does not have to lose hope for the future. I believe I have had a miracle recovery. However, recovery is much more positive an outcome if the person knows what they are recovering from. I shouldn’t have had to wait as long as I did for someone to tell me.

For more on my struggles after my brain injury, click here.

Gordon Johnson

Attorney Gordon Johnson is one of the nations leading brain injury advocates. He is Past-Chair of the TBILG, a national group of more than 150 brain injury advocates. He has spoken at numerous brain injury seminars and is the author of some of the most read brain injury web pages on the internet.

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