Hello everyone,

I have been lurking here for the past few weeks, reading old posts. They've been very helpful, but I wanted to post a thread to broach some of the issues that I'm personally dealing with.

I sustained a concussion in late March as the result of an assault. I was punched twice in the mouth and chopped twice in the jaw before falling over sideways (rightward). Initially, I didn't think that I lost consciousness. I was expecting to fall over the way I was being hit. I ‘opened’ my eyes after the fall, put on my glasses and leapt to my feet. I didn't feel dizzy, nauseous, or unstead on my feet. I did, however, have difficulty remembering my phone number when asked for it during the police report. I had to unlock my phone, look up my contact card, and read off my digits to the officer. After the report, I declined an ambulance, caught a city bus home and called my PCP, who told me to go to the ER. There I was diagnosed with a "jaw contusion," because the maxillofacial CT scan indicated no broken bones. My lip was swollen, but there wasn't even any bruising. The doctors didn't ask any questions that would enable to them to diagnose a concussion.

Following the assault, I experienced terrible insomnia and anxiety. The first few nights I couldn't sleep more than a few hours. Over time, I was able to get more and more sleep (~8h), but it continues to be fragmented. The anxiety first manifested itself through a fear of home invasion, which caused me to barricade my doors for the first few weeks. It then shifted to a fear of death-by-cancer and death-by-nuclear-annihilation. The doctors diagnosed me with acute stress disorder (ASD) when I went back to the ER. Now, three months out, my anxiety is much reduced. I continue to be wary of the strangers that I meet on the street but don't consider myself all that anxious otherwise.

Still, I spend a fair amount of time regretting the past (shoulda, woulda, coulda's) and worrying about the effects that the concussion has had and will have on my brain. I worry about how this injury will affect my intelligence since I am an academic. I worry about the accelerated brain aging that accompanies concussions (reduction in white matter). I worry about the possibility of dementia down the road. The worry of dementia is compounded by the fact that I have a close relative who suffered several brain injuries, including one severe brain injury in early adulthood (coma for 2 months) and another in middle age. This relative now has non-Alzheimer's dementia. The worry is further compounded by the fact that I have been struggling to get the necessary medical referrals.

At present, I "feel" normal for the most part. The headaches were never that bad and disappeared after the first week. The memory issues (retrieval) lasted maybe 2.5 months, but are mostly gone now. I never had nausea, double vision, or photophobia. My sleep continues to be fragmented with early morning wakings. But I go to bed when it gets dark and so, I don't really feel fatigued during the day. I guess the problem, though, is that I am not much comforted by being (mostly) asymptomatic. Whether I have symptoms or not, I know that I have sustained a life-changing brain injury. And it's hard to go forward...