Hello,

Though I do not have time to give the entire story behind my injury/recovery, I have some fears and questions I'd like to bring to the fore.
My TBI was 6 months ago. PCS symptoms abound since then, running the gamut from migraines and visual changes, to panic disorder, tinnitus, cognitive deficiency and lethargy.
In the month of May, however, I had about 3 weeks of what seemed like constant improvement. My symptoms began to let up considerably, and I found myself increasingly returning to activity, free of fear and the incessant pain I faced for the 5 months prior.

But in the past week or two, something new has arisen out of the miasma of head.
I have this one spot on my neck that seems swollen and radiates pain. The spot is just under the base of my skull, on the right side of my cervical spine. My neck has begun to feel very tense most of the time, and I find that as either the tension or my heart rate increases, blood rushes to this spot, then wraps around my head, after which I am gripped by symptoms of throbbing head pain, nausea, worsened visual symptoms, and dizziness.

This complication is causing me a great deal of fear. I am afraid that my initial injury set the course of a brain bleed. I fear that perhaps this spot in my neck is symptomatic of something in itself, such as a slowly growing AVN, aneurysm, or hemorrhage. At the moment I do not have the funds to get a CT scan or MRI, so I am not sure how else to elucidate the truth behind the fears. I try to tell myself that if I am to have a berry aneurysm rupture or a hemorrhage etc., then it is completely out of my control and simply how it will have to be. Is there any credence to these fears? Or is there any other reason for such severe symptoms to arise out of a stretch of time when I was seeing continuous improvement?
I should add that this cluster of pain/symptoms is not as bad in the morning. But by night time I am largely incapacitated.

Thank you,
Schuyler S.

Beelzebore92,

Welcome to NeuroTalk.

I have two ideas for you to consider.

First, Your return to normal activities may have been too quickly and caused a strain, both mentally and physically.

Second, you tender spot with swelling may be the occipital condyle. This is the facet on each side of the base of the skull where the lobes of C-1 fit. This can be injured during a concussion, mTBI or whiplash injury.

I don't think you have a legitimate reason to worry about an aneurism or other vascular issue. They would not be evident at the surface like a swollen joint would be.

Further understanding of your injury and recovery history would help.

My best to you.

Hi Mark In Idaho,

Firstly, thank you for your reply, and I am happy to be a new member of this site. Also woke up this morning not dead and not hospitalized, so I suppose I've let fear get the best of me again. What you have said about occipital condyle does sound logical. I too have considered that there is a strain, minor fracture, or slipped disc situation going on in the neck that's causing problems. I suppose the greatest frustration in my life right now is that I do not have the resources for MRI, much less other treatments, and so I am left assuming the worst in everything, and having little means of finding out what's what anymore.

As far as my injury/recovery goes, I feel stupid writing such a long verbose text, but will try my best to tell the story. I sustained a head injury at work in November, 2014. This was my third head injury in a span of two and a half years, with each subsequent injury bringing more severe and longer lasting symptoms into my life.

I have been a street skateboarder since I was 10 years old (I am now 22) and just three months prior to the workplace injury, I had slipped up doing a pretty routine trick. While going about 13 mph, I fell backwards and hit my head on the concrete, although I was able to roll out of it back onto my feet, somewhat lessening what would have otherwise been a direct impact.

I was living in NYC at the time and was still mentally/physically well enough to remain active, despite having what I now realize were mild PCS symptoms. I was self medicating (lorazepam and alcohol) and bussing tables in a very fast paced, high strung restaurant in the West Village. It was Thanksgiving night that I was accidentally struck in the head by another employee. I was in the kitchen clearing off dishes when the employee took a dish rack (weighing roughly 15 lbs) and forcefully swung it to get it on top of a shelf. This dishwasher guy was a big, heavy mofo, about 6'3 and weighed maybe 200 lbs. Unfortunately for me, he missed the shelf and struck me in the front of the head. I went down immediately, though was semi-conscious. I was taken to a hospital, had a CT scan (paid by employer) that came back "normal", and went home that night. The following day is when everything began to fall apart.

Some of the symptoms that ensued include a migraine headache which lasted 24/7 for 2 weeks, one instance of seizure, a dozen or more panic attacks per week for months, nystagmus and other optokinetic disorders, hearing loss, tinnitus, headaches, insomnia, and loss of balance/vestibular problems. But to me, the worst of all was losing my mind. More strange to me than losing memory/focus was that I spent long periods of time hallucinating. Hallucinations included bright lights, phantom like figures, voices, and sounds of explosions/car crashes in my head. I also had the most extreme streams of uncontrollable, racing thoughts I've ever experienced, worse than anything I've had on cocaine or other stimulants. The racing brain alternated with long periods of complete brain fog, lethargy, and inability to think at all. I never experienced these types of hallucinatory symptoms with previous head injuries. And they went on for months. Some of these experiences I jotted down in a journal when I had the shred of mental acuity necessary to do so.

I am incredibly thankful to say that many of these symptoms have since subsided, though some still exist daily, and others intermittently resurface. My recovery has been this. A month following the injury, I saw a neurologist who did not help at all, but diagnosed me PCS and PTSD with no advice for further treatment. I saw a psychiatrist who diagnosed me migraine with aura and major depression, prescribed paxil, klonopin (which I would not take on account of dependency issues) and topomax for migraines, which I would not take because of the swath of side effects it carries. I saw a neuropsychologist who was helpful with helping me sort out my mind while I could still afford to see her. She's actually the one who referred me to this website. I saw an acupuncturist once and a massage therapist once, both were helpful but too expensive to continue seeing.

Aside from that I am now a pescetarian, I quit drinking caffeine, quit narcotic drugs and alcohol, cut down my cigarette smoking by half, began sleeping on a normal, rigid schedule, and go for three gentle, mile long walks per day. I began doing light hatha yoga, meditation, chanting, ambient music therapy, and limiting exposure to loud noise, electronics, daylight, and other sources of stimulation. I had to let go of all of my friends/relationships. I have been relearning how to read, write, and think straight while keeping stress at a minimum.

I think that about covers everything, and again don't mean to be so long winded. :l

Hi Beelzebore

I'm sorry I don't have an answer for you about your neck issue, but wanted to post because a lot of what you went through sounds similar to what I went through. I know you don't want to hear this, but 6 months is not necessarily a long time for recovery. Each injury is different, but I'm over a year into it and just now starting to feel like myself again.

It sounds like you are doing a lot to heal yourself, which is great. I would say continue on this path and add activity very slowly. A good rehab. therapist can be very helpful with this. Try to go back to acupuncture and massage and get your neck treated if you can.

I think loved ones are very important through this also. You mentioned you lost friends and relationships. Is there anyone you can reach out to for help?

I wish you the best and hope you can find support here.

Beelezbore,

Did your WorkComp case get terminated ? You should reapply for WC care.

Your neck needs gentle care. There are no cartilaginous disks in that location. The joint can get injured and end up with an osteo-arthritis like inflammation. Icing it may help. A PT or chiro who knows how to do gentle upper cervical treatment would be helpful. It is also very important for you to be disciplined about head and neck posture during rest and sleep. A straight posture is best. Minimal elevation from a pillow. An expert with prolotherapy may help.

It take weeks and months of discipline to help this joint heal.

If your head hit the concrete skateboarding, no amount of rolling out of your fall will lessen the impact. An impact is a few milliseconds of force.

No more skateboarding. Maybe some day you can return with a helmet. Helmets don't prevent concussion but can reduce the severity by a very small amount.

BB,

You aren't alone. I was doing pretty good in recovery till 6 months and then I was hammered by symptoms. Sleep problems and anxiety came out of nowhere.

I am at 14 months now and exercise is very minimal.

I still have physical problems but anxiety has really slowed recovery I believe.

Bud

Sorry for the lapse in replies. The past two days have been especially rough, though today seems not as bad so far.

Hi RidingRollerCoaster,

Thank you for writing, and I'm happy to hear that you are starting to feel better. In a way, it's more encouraging to hear that recovery takes longer than I or the doctors originally thought. There's a lot of pressure to *get better faster*, as no one in my personal life seems to have any reference point for these kinds of struggles or how long they will take to work through. And thank you for your suggestions, I do hope to pursue therapies when I have the resources to do so. As for loved ones, I have lost touch with all of my friends and past romances. Perhaps people my age are just that fickle, or maybe I wasn't such a caring person myself in the past. I was very close with my ex-roommate over the past year, however his mother died, so in the early stages of my injury, going to him for support was like the blind leading the blind. We have since lost touch. I do have family but they seem to be at the end of their patience and very caught up in their own struggles, financial, interpersonal etc.

MarkInIdaho,

My Worker's Comp. is still in the first stage where I am in the process of gathering my medical records to send to the state.
Thank you for your suggestions for evaluating neck care and posture. I did take your advice and change my sleep position, and it seems to have somewhat helped. Do you recommend any neck exercises in the mean time, or should I simply wait until I can see a PT/chiro/etc.?
As far as returning to skateboarding goes, I couldn't agree with you more. Though the notion of leaving skateboarding for good has been the cause of much grief, I don't feel at all inclined to "roll the dice" with regards to my head/body after this is through. Though I'd also like to stay as far away from restaurants as possible, or anywhere in which tense people wield heavy objects in a fast paced work environment.

Since it is not closed, You should be able to get care under your WC claim.

It would be worth your while to read the Vitamins sticky at the top.

Did you leave NYC ? Where are you now ?

Could it be a trigger point in your neck? Trigger points in the neck and shoulder can create terrible head pain and all sorts of havoc.