[FrustratedMomma]

My 13 yr old son suffered a severe concussion on 09/29/11. Since then, our lives have been turned upside down. He has constant/every day headaches, terrible meltdowns with angry/violent mood swings, and constant lethargy. He is on 20 mg of amitriptyline (sp?), and Tylenol 3 only as needed.

Right after the accident in the ER he had a CT scan which came back clean. At the 4 week mark post accident, because of his continued and even increased symptoms, he had an MRI. It also came back not showing any skull francture, lesions, bleeding, etc.

He is only going to school for his core classes, every day from 10-2. That is still sometimes too much. The noise and fluorescent lights of school are his undoing, along with the concentration needed.

Our biggest adjustment is to his emotional meltdowns. He literally 'snaps' and becomes this person we do not know. It seems to happen if he's dealing with a particualrly bad headache or has 'overdone' it for the day...over-stimulated/tired. He will start talking in this baby talk kind of voice, and then just becomes so very hateful and mean. He will order everyone around, demand things, and if you do not do what he wants or try and combat him in any way...watch out. He has become extremely violent at times. A couple of weeks ago he demanded that his sister (age 14) get up and give him the seat on the couch and let him watch TV. She did not recogize he was "in mode" and just handled it like a normal sibling spat. He lost it completely, physically attacking her while wild-eyed and purple in the face, screaming all the while that he was "going to slash her throat, beat her with a baseball bat...." Last night at bedtime he was feeling very bad and he couldn't sleep. After about 1 hr, he walked into my room, completely off-balance physically. I led him back into his room, and he starts thrashing around saying "Im going to kill someone. Someone's going to die." The night went on and on, and needless to say, I stayed on watch and edge all night.

None of this was even remotely in his character before the accident. It is truly like Jeckyll and Hyde. Right now I am just thankful that he is a little guy and not some big sized 13 yr old.

These really bad episodes are not constant or even every day. He does have some decent days. He almost always hits some sort of wall though at the end of the day, even if he just becomes irritiable and starts the baby talk thing.

The Dr he is seeing is a Sports Medicine guy who specializes in concussions. He has been very good with him, and us as well. He has said that with the severity of his concussion, we could still be seeing and dealing with symptoms for months to come. He has suggested that if at the 3 mos mark we are still dealing with a lot of the emotional issues, it may be time to dig our heels in for the 'long haul' recovery plan and to think about getting him with a Behavioral Specialist to help him cope through the next stage of his recovery.

First and foremost, we want to help him. It is breaking our hearts to literally watch our sweet boy turn into this mean/hateful/violent person we don't know. Secondly, we are struggling mightily to make sense and keep our heads above water in this new world we've entered into. Because of his revised school schedule, our work schedules have taken a beating. Because of his issues, our home life and family evenings are completely battered. My daughter is getting the brunt of his negative attention and our lack of positive attention due to all of our concentration on him, however hard we try for that not to be the case.

I really wouldn't wish any of this on anyone, but at the same time, if anyone out there has/is dealing with a similar situation, it woud be nice to hear from you.