Episode 25. Thrown Away After Brain Injury. Second Discussion with Nick

This is the second podcast recording with Nick. Nick made the cover art for this episode (https://linktr.ee/nicomedia). Thrown away after a brain injury is a horrible abandonment that happens to many people after they are brain injured. When Nick shared this picture with me I was struck by the pain, the faces, the guy throwing out the trash bags. I asked Nick to make that guy a doctor, and instead he stuck that “MD” badge on his chest. Here is the first podcast with Nick.https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/experiencing-my-brain-episode-15-injury-to-what-makes/id1596998070?i=1000592945732After the first recording I wanted to speak with Nick much more about his loss of self and using philosophy to make sense of brain injury problems. Nick had bilateral subdural hematomas around his parietal lobes and he had a midline shift. Depersonalization, the loss of self is a complicated internal problem, his description and efforts to make sense of what changed in himself. It remind me of my loss of internal self.Here is a neuroscience seminar that compliments this podcast about the brain networks that create self, Nick and other brain injured people in the audience asks some excellent questions. Together the brain science and listening to what people have to say helps illustrate what deporsonalization is like, and what happens in your mind once you have injured the networks that create self, in the brain.https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YBUNOLfom6A&t=4sNick describes being thrown away by the people around him after brain injury. I have met many people who get abandoned by their families and are left with no support. This is a major problem. Without support how can a person work to improve themselves? Hopefully, the people around brain injured individuals can learn to listen to what each brain injured person is dealing with, to accept that the person has very real invisible challenges, and that things can improve with the right help and support. Hopefully the people around us can learn to be be more willing to be supportive.Unfortunately, finding the right help and support is also a problem.