Tips, strategies, approaches, attitudes and ways to support a person living with disability in particular brain injury
The 'Power of 10'. An easy-to-use tool to get the creative juices flowing and generate possibilities. Have you found it hard to think of new ideas or solutions? Maybe you struggle to find ways to enable people to really participate in their community. The Power of 10 can help generate ideas. Talking About the Power of 10 It really is a simple tool to use and can have astounding results. Some background first: Where did it come from? Discovering the Power of 10. Why use it? The benefits . What is it? The Power of 10 in practice. How can the Power of 10 be used? Many Uses for The Power of 10 Discovering the Power of 10 For those of you who are mathematics inclined, the The Powers of 10 might be familiar in its original mathematical form. Me, I am not too familiar with maths, but I do understand the maths and the tool I use, have to do…
Today the topic of 'Brain Injury' gets streeeeeeeeetched. The reason for this is that I recently made two discoveries. One was that the Readers Digest magazine is still being published. While flicking through a copy I made a second discovery: an article about Echolocation. I found it fascinating. People using a kind of human sonar to navigate their world. I really wanted to share this discovery so I set out to find a way to link the topic echolocation with brain injury? The following is what I came up with. Attempting to Link Echolocation and Brain Injury Once I put my mind to it the links leapt out at me: [unordered_list style="tick"] Echolocation highlights just how amazing the brain is and its capacity to learn new skills. It demonstrates that sometimes, with training and determination, new skills and new brain pathways can work around difficulties. It reminds us we do not fully use all our capacities. We could train ourselves to…
Image by Lotte Grønkjær
What if we changed our thinking? What if we focussed more on what a person could be contributing after brain injury? Rather than what's going wrong and what help is needed? Today I am going to indulge an idea I have nurtured for a long time. The idea of supporting people living with brain injury who wish to give, or contribute to find a way. It has been prompted by the giving frenzy that accompanies many people celebrating Christmas, and an article in DailyGood. The topic on DailyGood that caught my eye was “The Neuroscience of Why Gratitude Makes Us Healthier”. The article talks about how doing good, and being thankful can impact our health – in a good way. We hear how giving and contributing are good for us. How it helps build communities. Generally we humans like to be, and to feel, useful. Mostly we get a kick out of doing something for others. [box size="large" style="rounded" border="full"]I remember a story…
As we start a new, fresh year I thought it timely to share something to really get us thinking and doing. I don’t know how to introduce this re-post. I am a bit overawed by it. It made me squirm with uncomfortableness, while at the same time helped me understand better. It pulls no punches, it’s plain language. It’s a lot of worthwhile stuff to think about whoever, and wherever you are. A must read. A must re-read regularly. A warning upfront for anyone with sensitive ears or eyes – it contains swearing but pleeeease don’t let that stop you. It is not specifically about brain injury but is probably more useful than many words I have written, or that I have seen written about accessibility in all it’s forms. I am really sorry there is not author information here but you can visit the BRACE website or Facebook page for more. Here is the post as it was written: this…
'Lack of insight' describes a common outcome of brain injury. I believe this term needs great care to understand properly and respond to appropriately. It takes a careful, thoughtful, approach to see it as a description; an outcome of brain injury; and not a criticism, or a negative comment. For people with brain injury this is a real outcome caused by damage to the brain. It is not deliberate. Maybe using the correct term ‘Anosognosia’ would help depersonalise the term. If you heard a person had ‘anasognosia’ would you think and respond differently, than hearing a person has a 'lack of insight after brain injury'? How Does Lack of Insight After Brain Injury Happen? Insight refers to a person’s ability to see their situation as it is. The skills needed to do this effectively are managed mainly by the frontal lobes. If damage occurs to the frontal lobe of the brain, there may be difficulties recognising and accepting changes. Difficulty seeing…
You will likely hear how life changes after brain injury in many, many, ways. Both big and small changes. Changes such as no longer being able to work, not being able to get to the corner shop to buy a snack, relationship changes, or finding that watching a movie is no longer enjoyable, as it's too hard to follow. Today the discussion focuses on the changes and losses that can come with life changes after brain injury, along with some ideas for strategies to support a person live life after brain injury. This article, and the introduction last week focus on the life changes after brain injury. You can read the full article Brain Injury Life Changes or below are some key points to remember: The losses associated with life after brain injury are often underestimated by everyone involved. While the physical and cognitive affects of brain injury are different for each person, the impact on their lives can have similar…
You want to use a strengths based approach, but where do you start? What does it mean in real life? How do you ask strengths based questions to identify and understand your own, or another person’s strengths? Do you find you a strengths approach comes naturally to you? Or have you found it difficult? We are often more used to looking for problems, rather than looking at what is working. Looking at what is going wrong, rather than what’s going right. Giving solutions instead of looking at what can be built on; finding out what solutions and resources a person, or group already has. It seems even our brain may be programmed to catastrophise as a first response. Looking at the worst case, imagining what might go wrong. I am definitely a “catastrophiser” (I made that up so don’t worry about looking for a definition). A strengths approach and strength based questions still do not come naturally. It is still practice, practice,…
If you are wondering what King Henry VIII brain injury and behaviour change have in common. A clue - It is part of fascinating research into the life and health of King Henry. Read on for more: KING HENRY VIII AND THE JOUSTING INCIDENT In 1536, King Henry was taking part in a jousting match, a sport where opponents on horseback joust (or fight) armed with long heavy spears, wearing a full suit of armour. During this match King Henry fell from his horse. The horse then fell on top of him. He was unconscious for a time and it was thought he would not survive. His queen at the time, Anne Boleyn, was distraught. It was following this incident, his behaviour and personality apparently changed considerably. It is thought this resulted from frontal lobe damage. If you are interested in more about King Henry, brain injury and behaviour change, you can read more in this article “The Jousting Accident…
Having a strong ethical framework for brain injury supporters to work from, can help you manage ethical dilemmas as they arise – and they do. Often dilemmas happen with little or no time to sit and think about it, or time to call in the experts. It is rarely as easy as ‘Right or Wrong’ and each dilemma is likely to be different. How do you develop your own process for making ethical decisions and choices? Today a look at developing an ethical framework for brain injury support. ETHICAL DILEMMA AND ETHICAL FRAMEWORK FOR BRAIN INJURY Mostly we don’t think about any of this. Well, not until we are slap bang up against an ethical dilemma. So today it’s not so much a ‘how to’. It’s more a start here, and keep working on it. Here is a couple of examples to get you thinking: Joe is not able to move about without help. He has cognitive difficulties, as a result of…
Have you come across real life ethical dilemmas around brain injury? Maybe you have found yourself facing an ethical challenge? This week I had been thinking a lot about an ethical dilemma posed at the end of a stunning presentation at a brain injury conference some time in the 1990's. The paper was presented by Rabbi Dr Milton Pine describing his experience of brain injury. At the close of his presentation he said: "if you are going to make us live, don't bury us alive". This powerful statement has stuck in my mind since that time. I believe it highlights an ethical dilemma around brain injury. The cost of emergency and acute care for a person, compared with what is provided for life long living, and community care. An ethical dilemma we could all think more about. I then decided to focus on ethics and ethical dilemmas about brain injury for this article. Unfortunately when I started thinking, researching, writing, revising.…