Conventional methods of brain injury rehabilitation result in certain mainstay methods and steps.

For us transitioning from ICU to a sub-acute facility was painful and difficult. Fully not understanding what brain trauma and brain damage really encompasses we stumbled our way through. I can honestly say that many of the accepted establishments were far from acceptable as they were unsanitary and often smelled of urine. We were left with the challenge of finding a facility that could care for our son, who had experienced a severe head injury ,the way that we would. The search for brain injury rehab would begin. After the must needed visit to over 10 so-called high ranked establishments we finally decided on a hospital based home for our son. They had extensive experience with cognitive rehabilitation and brain tbi.

Entering the 5th floor and exiting to your right you come upon two hallways, each with a two patient room on either side, right or left. The nurses station can be found central to all the patients rooms so that they can monitor the patients who have experienced extensive and severe brain injury. You see, no one really knows what it is like until they’ve experienced it for themselves.  Hopefully they never will.

According to Websters dictionary the words brain Aneurysm means aneurynein to dilate , and eurynein to stretch. It is an abnormal blood filled dilation of a blood vessel and an artery resulting from disease of the vessel wall.

They can and do grow as it happened to Aposol.

A thirty five year old charge nurse who came to the United States with his young wife to find a better life found out the hard way. It was said that he was indeed the best charge nurse on the floor because he cared so deeply about his patients, others who had suffered brain injuries. He would stimulate his patients during the night with heartfelt music making sure that each one of them were comfortable. He had worked hard to succeed and according to Alin, his wife, they had planned most of their young lives to come to the United States. Aposol’s mother died one year after Aposol left Romania.

Aposol was a strikingly good looking man with very dark eyes about 6 feet tall although I never saw him standing as after his accident. I met him five years after the injury which apparently grew to over one inch putting pressure on the surrounding brain.

It was said that on that night Aposol had begun to experience a severe headache and nausea. He collapsed onto the floor and was then rushed only one floor down to the emergency room. There he received excellent care and was very fortunate to have survived as a stroke or death is very common. Sixty percent of people with ruptures will die within a year. Aposol didn’t, he survived. Surgery was necessary to prevent further bleeding and Alin was a wreck. Aposol became one of his patients roommates shortly thereafter.

It was apparent that Aposol’s brain aneurysm was due to his brain anatomy. The aneuysm grew until it burst.

As Aposol began recovering from his surgery and emerging from the coma that incurred signs of a “locked in” syndrome became evident. He had lost much weight and although he couldn’t move a muscle he was aware of everything around him.

Locked in syndrome is common and very hard. The characteristics of the syndrome are quadriplegia with preservation of consciousness. Aposol retained vertical eye movement and eventually was able to speak in a faint whisper. His Romanian wife was by his side when she was not at work. She worked very hard to build his muscles which had diminished to nothing. She bought electric cyclers for his legs. She would demand that he speak to her. She fed him without doctors orders. She would drape him in sheets and walk him for miles around the hospital property.

She would lean over him and tell him to “shush” with a smile on her face when he would misbehave.

I was privileged one night to be sitting next to Alin and Aposol during a Christmas recital when Aposol suddenly found humor in the gospel singers. He sat with a crooked smile and began laughing hysterically. His eyes welled up with tears of laughter as he spat between his clenched lips. Alin tried to correct him as if he was a small boy laughing in church but her delight was quite obvious. She wiped the drool from his cheek and glanced at me with her huge dark eyes. I, too, began smiling as I observed this. It is a day I will never forget.

Then one day she announced that she would be taking her husband back to their foreign country. They would work on Aposol’s mothers home which had stood vacant since her death for the last four years. He would be better because he would be near family. Apparently Romania does alot of Reiki , hydrotherapy and massage for brain injury and since the country is socialistic Alin felt that she could choose which establishment would be best for Aposol.

Aposol and Alin are now in their country where they began life. I’m sure that Aposol is doing great as I know he has Alin beside him pushing him for wellness.