420,

What a story. Sounds a lot like mine. My first serious concussion was in 1965 at 10 years old. I had a minor concussion a year earlier when I fell down a flight of stairs. The stairs were fine. It was that sudden stop at the landing that was problematic.

Prior to my serious concussion, I had many friends and got along with just about everyone. Then I had a bad bike accident and ended up hospitalized for three days with slurred speech. My world started changing rapidly. I routinely struggled with depression. I contrived many ways to try end it by trying to make it look like an accident. Most of my friends left me. Some just turned their backs on me.

At the time, we had no idea about Post Concussion Syndrome. My mother told my wife a few years back that I was no longer her 'sweet little boy.' My grades suffered with ups and downs. Then I had three relatively OK years. It wasn't until 10th grade in late 1969 that I developed a absence seizure disorder (petit mal back then) and my grades plummeted again. My neuro pointed to my soccer playing and heading the ball as the trigger. No recognized concussions during soccer play.

After a two year recovery, my senior year was good and I graduated with Honors. Then during my second semester of college studying as a pre-dentistry major, I suffered a very minor concussion and soon after a very high fever (104.7 was measured after I had been cooled down for about an hour. ) My academic struggles returned and I had to drop my Dentistry intentions. I came close to flunking out. I turned to the lower stress environment of the local junior college system.

After 20 years of self-employment while trying to keep stress levels and head risks low, I suffered another very minor concussion that destroyed most of what memory functions I still had. The last two neuro-psych assessments show my immediate and short term visual and auditory memory in the bottom 5 to 12 % of the population. My processing speed at the bottom 10% level but with my intelligence still useful at the top 5 to 2% levels.

The neuro-psych PhD and PsyD both tried to say that my high intelligence scores make my memory and processing speed scores doubtful, even though the validity scales of 48 and 49 out of 50 show no chance of malingering. Malingering would be scores of 35 and below.

My visual processing and memory make it difficult to drive so I rarely do.

Most likely, you have developed many work-arounds and accommodations to allow you to live a life. I found that it also was helpful to move to Idaho from California to get away from the hectic pace and other risks.

I am eager to read your posts. You likely have some memory work-arounds that can help us all.

My best to you.