I’m writing because I’m feeling alone. I feel as though my situation may be somewhat unique and I’m curious to see if anyone has had a similar experience.

Since January of 2008, I’ve had at least 5 concussions. I don’t play contact sports or partake in high risk activities. I am a teacher. I am completely confused as to how it has been possible for me to have this many concussions in as little as three years, let alone my lifetime. For some reason I cannot stop hitting my head. My first concussion was from hitting it twice in one day, my second from banging into a wooden play house, my third from smashing into a closet door, my fourth from hitting it on my car door, and my fifth from hitting it on a shelf. I’m really not positive if there have been more, as I have hit my head several times while still recovering from some of them. Though I don’t know if this is true, I’ve read that each concussion can be more serious than the last and that after you’ve had one concussion, it becomes easier to sustain others because your head has become overly sensitive to any kind of a blow.

My symptoms seem to differ slightly with each concussion. Sometimes I just have horrible headaches and fatigue, other times I’m confused and have trouble remembering things, and with others I see spots and flashes of light along with the headaches. It seems as though I’m never not recovering from a concussion.

I’m just feeling extremely frustrated because I don’t know how or why this keeps happening, or how to make it stop. Maybe I’m rushing around too much and not paying attention to where my body is. Maybe I have bad peripheral vision and can’t see what’s around me, or maybe the lasting affects of my first concussion have permanently altered my balance so that I’m always off-kilter. I’m embarrassed and I feel like my situation is ridiculous. I don’t want to tell my friends or co-workers what has happened to me because I’m afraid they’ll think I’m crazy or making it up. I’ve even gone against ER doctors' orders and returned to work immediately after some of my concussions because I didn’t want to have to explain to anyone why I had to be out again.

I plan on seeing my doctor this week for some guidance, seeing as my most recent concussion was 3 weeks ago and I’ve hit my head three more times since then and I’m just not sure where to go from here. I’m tired of feeling out of it, forgetting things, seeing spots, being fatigued and having headaches. I’m also very worried about the long term affects of multiple concussions including early-onset dementia and Alzheimer’s.

Has anyone else here experienced anything similar to this? I’d really appreciate your feedback. Thank you!

My first question for you will require some serious remembering.

Do you remember having any concussions or even just head bumps that left a bruise or bump prior to the last three years? You will likely need to spend a few days thinking about your concussion history prior to three years ago.

Second, tell us a little about yourself. Your post sounds like you are female. How about your age?

Have you endured any serious emotional stressors lately?

How about any prolonged illnesses or a high fever?

There are a lot of factors than can play a part in your situation. The above questions may help find some answers.

Your concussions and or head impacts may just be a cluster or may be related to your awareness of impacts to your head.

From now on, I suggest you keep a journal of any symptoms or further head impacts. Include the other things that are before your impacts, such as poor sleep, waking up feeling groggy, late night out, emotional stressors, chemical stressors (alcohol, medications, etc).

Hopefully, we will be able to point you in a direction for help or understanding.

My best to you.

Hello and thank you for your reply.

I am a 26 year old female from MA. I have no history of concussions prior to 2008 and no history of prolonged illness or high fevers. My stress level is pretty much the same it has always been, emotional or otherwise.

I'm not sure if my injuries could be considered cluster headaches since most of the time when I hit my head I go to the ER and they tell me I have another full blown concussion.

I began to keep a record of my issues and symptoms after my first concussion and I have continued to do so. I have noticed that my injuries do not seem to coincide with any specific factor such as a late night, alcohol comsumption, feeling tired or groggy etc as you have suggested. From what I can tell they are random.

Hopefully this information helps.

Sounds as though your concussions have started at the same time as your teaching career. Could it be that you are distracted by or overly focused on your teacher duties and not aware of the risk if hitting your head? Some people can get so focused on the task before them that they lose focus on the other issues around them. My wife is like this.

If this is your case, it sounds like you need to somehow, learn to be aware of your surroundings while you are focused on your teaching duties. It can be a challenge to develop the mindset to be more aware of your surroundings but it can be done.

There are methods of training your eyes/brain to be more aware of your visual surroundings. An occupational therapist may be able to help.

Upon looking this thread over, I've realized that I made a mistake. My concussions began in 2009, not 2008.

All in all I've been teaching for about 6 years so I'm not sure it could just be related to that. Granted, some of my concussions have occurred at work but not all of them.

Thank you for the suggestion of using an occupational therapist. I will mention this to my doctor when I seem him in the near future.

Hi,

Your story resonates with me; I also have a habit of accidentally hitting my head.

It has been demoralising and have found myself wishing for a guarantee that I would never hit my head again. I find it frustrating as it makes work and also socialising more difficult; mainly through a loss of confidence rather than physical side effects.

It is random for me as well, though always seems to happen when I feel I am doing well, recovering and making progress from the last time it happened. Or so it seems, which makes it difficult to accept.

Owing to this anxiety, I have moved from being unaware of rushing to overly vigilant about hitting my head. I think the later is potentially worse, as it means I think about my head much more and when I do hit my head it is harder because it has become my greatest fear.

Unfortunately this anxiety has also led to not knowing quite when I have hit my head. Sometimes I think I may have hit my head, though cannot be sure and would re-trace my steps and check the angles, to gain reassurance that I didn't.

That said, slowing down and being more mindful about the task at hand does help to prevent it, or it at least increase the time until it happens again. Think Mark from Idaho is right about being more aware. Most of accidents can be attributed to a lack of awareness, although this is not always on my part. I have found it difficult to convince myself that I can be aware all of the time and avoid it, which has been a depressing and fatalistic thought.

Anxiety about hitting my head has played a major role in my life for eight years. I have had six concussions; four playing sport, two as a child growing up. I am also 26 and work at a Big Four 4 accountancy firm in London.

As I have my final accountancy exams approaching and a heavy 'work work' workload I have sought therapy to help increase the amount of time I have and reduce the amount of time thinking about my head.

I had my first session last week- the following helped:

First point was that thoughts determine feelings. If I think of myself as 'less than before' then I am only going to feel worse. So I try and avoid that thinking. It is a road to nowhere, which know from running up and down it.

Second point was that have to believe I can end this cycle of thinking and behaviour. If I believe then have a better chance.

This is the second set of therapy I have had. The first set followed a concussion whilst skiing. I managed on and off in between and always thought 'I will be ok as long as it does not happen again.'

The most useful parts of the first therapy sessions was the thought that:

Either you have done some damage to your brain and you need to accept it or you haven't damaged your brain and the problem is psychological, in which case you need to work on that psychological problem.

I was also encouraged to diarise and focus on good posture to improve confidence. Both helped/ help.

So- have found there is no magic bullet for this problem, but a combination of the right thought and actions can make you less conscious of it. If you are less conscious of it, you will be safer.

Aside from that, at work I find that single tasking is really helpful when doing my own work, though clearly teaching is a different role.

That all said, hit my head today, which is partly why I am here! Not completely though- hopefully the above is of some help.

'Fear sometimes makes the wolf seem bigger than it is.'

After my initial accident I was having what I was told were siesures. I would just find my self on a floor and not know what happend. while still working one time I know that i had to have been half way up a pretty big ladder to have ended up on the floor the way I did. I think many months later after having finaly been off work for a while I was feeling great and though it was all over. Unfortunately I do not know if it was another siesure but I came to at the bottom of stairs and from there started all over again. Then for the hole winter at least I could not stand up out side basicaly at all I think. Any thing slippery and I would almost do a flip and end up flat. A lot of times I would walk in the house and my girl friend would ask me what happend and I would not know what she meant. She would ask how I got another cut on my head or arms or legs or what ever and I did not know.

I remember reading a post here about being turned down for life insurance and also some where else or some one told me about how our life is expected to be a lot shorter just because we had a tbi and I always wonder if that is why. Because it gives us wors balance or eye sight or siesures or all of it and it is just probability that sooner than later one of them is going to finish the job.

Hi,

Thanks so much for replying. I'm sorry all of that has happened to you and that you hit your head again, that's rough. However, I do have to say that I am so glad to have found someone who understands what I'm going through. Your post was comforting to me because it makes me feel as though I'm not the only person this has ever happened to. Your therapy experiences sound promising and I'm glad you've found some coping strategies. Therapy is probably something I should seek out at some point. I've also got an appointment with an ophthalmologist next month to test my peripheral vision because I wonder if maybe that might have something to do with all of this.

Do you ever feel angry about it? Every time I hit my head now, I immediately become very angry. Disappointed in myself in a way because I allowed it to happen again. I try not to feel that way since I know it's an accident but I can't always help it.

Do you have PCS? I'm wondering if/worried that my doctor may tell me that I have it now. It's been 3 or 4 weeks since my last official concussion and I'm still having symptoms. I guess I'll find out in a couple of days.

Have you shared your situation with your family, friends and co-workers? If so, how have they reacted to it?

Thanks again for your response. Good luck with your exams!

I went to see my primary care doctor today and he referred me to a neurologist as I hoped he would. He said he thinks its time for another MRI to check out what's going on in my brain which I was also happy about. I can't have any more CT scans since I've apparently had too many over too short of a time span.

When my doctor checked my reflexes he noticed that they were asymmetrical. The reflexes on my right side are much stronger than on my left. I don't know what that means but it seems kinda scary so I'm hoping that the neurologist can shed some light on why that's happening.

Has anyone else experienced this?

Hey,

I used to become angry and think that I was cursed in some way; it was my fate to hit my head.

Now, it is more just a loss of confidence. I do not feel able to do time pressured or difficult tasks; or feel less able to do them as well.

I tend to need time to recover, which is usually time, which is quite self destructive. So instead of going to the gym, I would order a takeaway. Then recover at some point the following day- normally be being focused on something else. Even study can ok in that respect! Sometimes!

The therapy has been useful. The focus of it at the moment is writing down what my thought patterns are so that they can then be challenged.

There was also the point, that being very careful makes no difference as to whether I hit my head or not, so why bother. Potentially sound, but potentially danagerous advice. Not sure.

I don't think I have PCS. My last concussion was in Jan 08' and maybe had it then, in the difficult months after it, when I was worried about what had changed in me and what I could do in the future.

I have shared my experiences with my family and close friends, who have been very supportive. I told my previous employer when I had a concussion, to set their expectations about what I could do. They were understanding, which helped.

Fortunate in that have quite a strong support network, though their help has not cured the issue; they cannot change what has physically happened. They do provide reassurance and are a rational sounding board when read too much into a simple bump on the end. Therapy has helped though. Quite like it being independent of family and friends; it spreads the burden from them.

I think the descision to tell your employer is very personal and difficult one. Traditionally disclosing health issues, which border on mental health, was seen, as far as I've been told, as damaging to a career, as it might follow you around. Though attitudes change; would do what is pragmatic and tell your employer if you think it would help. From their perspective, they can't help if you don't tell them.

Aside from that issue, yes think if you do have access to it, then seek help early. There is a lot of good help out there and nothing to lose if the status quo is really upsetting, which it is, if and when focus on an injury.

Hope it all improves for you soon! You're definitely not alone.