Vanessa W. Transcript

Hi, my name is Vanessa Woodburn and this is my concussion story. My concussion happened almost six years ago while I was traveling overseas. I live near Toronto, Canada and my husband and I were on a cycling adventure in Italy. We were there with friends and celebrating our 20th wedding anniversary. Anyway, one day about halfway through the trip, I had a really bad crash on my bike. I don’t remember any of it. And the parts of the story that I share with people are only because of retelling from those that were with me. But in the days and the weeks and the months that followed, like many of you, my symptoms were ranging and varying all over the map. For sure, I know I dealt with headaches, and confusion and memory issues. And that changed over time.

As some of those things started to settle down, that changed over time into more like executive function cognitive problems (things like decision making and problem solving, prioritizing). I experienced often, what I now know and concussion lingo, they call flooding. It’s like everything comes rushing in to me all at once. And at that time and for a couple of years, I really struggled with just sifting and sorting through all that information. The flooding made everything feel kind of like white white noise, like I couldn’t grab and hold on to any information because it all seemed to be right there in front of me all at the same time. And that was probably one of the hardest things. My identity pre concussion was of a very smart, capable woman involved in so many things in my work life, my family life, in the community, and to all of a sudden not feel capable or competent of going back to those things at the level that I had been really really shook my sense of identity.

I think the hardest thing was asking myself, you know, months later, Who am I now? and Will this ever get better? And I found that I was really, really hard on myself. You know, I thought I was doing all the things and I wasn’t meeting the expectation of where I thought I should be in my recovery and healing. The people around me were patient but I really struggled to be patient with myself. I’m a very patient, compassionate person with other people. I really struggled to turn that inwards to myself. And really a turning point for me – a therapist that I was working with to help me with the post concussion journey – this was about six months afterwards. You know, she heard me talking, she heard myself talk and then what I was describing to her. And she said to me, Vanessa, can you talk to yourself like someone you love? And said wait a minute. Hold on. They’re telling me that again, like what does that mean? What does that look like? What does that sound like? And when I really started to dive into that, and I realized this was a turning point for me. And so much of where I was struggling, was in just expecting everything to be exactly the same as it was pre concussion and not giving myself any room or any grace for a period of time where I could be working towards getting better. But I was still worthy of love, even from myself, that love and compassion from myself, in the process. And I didn’t have to be exactly who I was to still love and care and honor and nourish myself along the way. And so that began a much much gentler approach for me in healing from my concussion.

And I would say you know, after about a year or so, after a lot of work with in therapy for the emotional recovery, also working with an osteopathic practitioner and cranial sacral therapy, working with a chiropractor and a physiotherapist for some dizziness vestibular issues that I had, I also worked with a naturopath. I was also training going through my certification to be a health coach myself; I had almost finished when my concussion happened. So really putting together everything that I was learning into being a health coach for myself and healing myself. It was probably the best motivation, to really dig deep into all of that, but after about a year, I really started to feel the tide turning and two and a half years later, I actually wrote a book to talk about the steps that I had kind of taken myself through to heal and to feel better. The book is called Bounce Back: Reclaim Your Life After a Concussion, and it was for sure another turning point for me to be able to share this, these steps, and help other people. But I know that one of the ways that I have changed along this process is like I just said learning to be more gentle, and kind, and compassionate with myself when I go through a hard time when I make a mistake when I fall – you know not always literally metaphorically as well, or just don’t like don’t meet the expectations that I have for myself. Because I think we all go through moments like that. And I have found that learning to be kinder and more compassionate with myself, to really talk to myself like someone I love, ask myself, What do you need?, and learn how to take care of myself in that way and offer to myself the things that I need whether it’s healthy food, whether it’s getting up and getting moving, whether it’s spending time with friends. I’ve learned to really ask myself that question, and then listen for the answer and then act on it. And I’ve also discovered this other side of self compassion, not just the kind and gentle side but also this fear side of self compassion where I have to really provide for myself and protect myself and establish those boundaries and let myself discover what’s okay for me and what isn’t, and then learn how to communicate that with other people what’s okay and what isn’t. And this side of self compassion has also come into play when I need to be accountable to myself with love, of course. It’s all connected, and it’s all a big cycle.

That would be my advice for people as they’re going through this journey. Keep reaching out for help, keep asking for help. And also make sure that you’re open to receiving it. That was one of the biggest lessons I learned: to ask for help and then allow it in, allow myself to receive the help, the love and support that other people are offering. And it becomes actually a beautiful thing because now I feel like I have more sense of that happening around me and it’s a give and take in the beautiful ripple effect with other people too. And people around me that I think are more open now to giving and receiving as well. So ask for help. Receive the help. Talk to yourself like someone you love and keep uncovering what it is that you need next. I didn’t find my answers working with one helper. I found that my greatest healing came when I had a network of people who were knowledgeable and who had experience in treating and helping someone who’d had a concussion. So I would say keep keep going. Don’t leave any stone unturned. This really is a process of healing your brain, your body from this trauma and all the inflammation and everything that happens, but there’s also an emotional healing for your Mind Body Spirit that needs to happen as well. So leave room for that and let yourself explore that side of the healing as well. Thank you very much for listening, and for Eliana for inviting me to share my story.