Hello all, my name is Danny and I have found this forum to be very helpful in dealing with my post concussion syndrome. I feel it is time for me to contribute something.

Let me begin my telling my story. I suffered a concussion from a door being swung violently into my forehead. Luckily it just missed my eye. This took place on October 2, 2014.

Now, I had just finished moving to a new apartment within walking distance to a school I transferred to this semester. I was accepted into the chemical engineering program and I was really excited about moving on with my education and career. The timing couldn't have been worse.

The next morning after the injury I got up at 8am and went to all my classes and was fine. That evening I started to feel very dizzy and nauseous. Luckily it was the weekend so I hoped to be ready for an exam in physical chemistry on Monday. By Sunday night, I was having panic attacks and clearly I was in trouble. I knew in my heart that something was wrong. My girlfriend took me to urgent care where they gave me a doctors note for a week out of school. I was advised to rest and not use any electronics.

So I took the week off. I started to go back to classes but I couldn't do any of the work. I was in hell with symptoms for 3 weeks - dizziness, muscle twitching, headaches, brain fog. After about a month, I noticed an improvement where I could actually use my phone or watch tv for more than 10 minutes.

Fast forward to this past week; Finals Week. Most of my professors have been very understanding about postponing exams but finals I kind of had to just tough it out. Keep in mind the courses I'm taking are extremely difficult for anyone, even without a concussion. Anyway, I was actually feeling pretty much like myself before I started studying last Sunday

What happened is every day my brain could take less and less studying and by Thursday I was fried. I still had my math final which could have been the hardest. I had a mental breakdown on Thursday when I could barely study for 30 minutes. I was feeling as bad as I did that first weekend.

Interestingly once I got some rest, I was able to study for a little. I developed a routine of studying for 30 min then resting for 30 minutes. Some people may find that to be helpful. Basically study as long as you can until the symptoms come and then take a break. No cheating with this system or else it won't work.

So here I sit, 11 weeks post concussion, successfully having made it through finals and feeling decent. I'm very exahausted but the headaches are mostly gone. I still get a little nervous in crowds and have some issues with blurry vision. Overall I am thankful to be recovering. I have spent a lot of time in dark rooms just resting and I think it has paid off.

If anyone is wondering I got Bs on the exams and am taking incompletes in two of my four courses. I guess I'm resting for the next two weeks and then finishing the coursework in January so that I can continue next semester.

I guess I just wanted to share my story. While I'm certainly a different person than I was pre injury, I'm definitely recovering. Hope that someone out there gets something worthwhile out of this.

Just a couple questions: any thoughts on whether I should take next semester off to recover more? Should I be ok going forward? It's so tough to gauge when the symptoms are gonna come. Chemical engineering is tough coursework and I want to be healthy for it but I also don't want to miss courses and delay my graduation.

Also, what do people think about antianxiety medications (benzodiazepines) like lorazepam? I've been prescribed 1 mg twice a day.

Thanks for taking the time to read this! Everyone hang in there and be thankful for today.

-Danny