JOURNAL OF THE NATIONAL ACADEMY FOR CHILD DEVELOPMENT
1984, Volume 4, No. 1
Trauma Recovery
Robert Silverman
When "Dr. Bob" Doman suggested
that I write a section for his book, I was a bit puzzled.
"Write something about attitude," Dr. Bob suggested.
Now that word didn't seem adequate but we failed to come up
with a better one. Yet it is really attitude that has driven
me to do this rigorous neurological program for nearly seven
years, and very successfully I might add. Actually, whatever
arms you with enough fortitude to continue in the midst of
despair is surely the right attitude.
Let me familiarize you with my case.
In 1976, I was struck by a car that sped through a red light.
I was crossing the street where I shouldn't have and failed
to look. My life would change in that instant, I was struck
at 50 MPH and landed head first on the cement roadway. I was
rushed to an emergency room. Both legs were broken. An orthopedic
surgeon performed a fine series of operations and saved both
legs. At one point gangrene had infected the left leg, and
it was about to be amputated. My orthopedic surgeon, however,
insisted that they wait. Luckily they did and the gangrene
disappeared. I was not to learn until much later that the
decision that would save my leg would eventually play a large
part in my ability to do these exercises and save my life,
make my brain well.
When I awoke from the coma, I was in
a neurological ward. Yet, I barely knew that. I did not know
where I was or what had happened to me. I felt that "something
big" had happened. It felt as if ten sandbags lay on
top of my head. That feeling was from hydrocephalus that wasn't
to be detected or even tested for in twenty months of conventional
treatment.
Everything was very dark and what I
could make out was in double images. I spoke in eerie, haphazard
bursts and was disassociated both from body and surroundings.
At one point, I finally realized what had happened, loudly
announced that I had been hit by a car, and promptly lapsed
back into the coma, not uttering a sound for days. When I
did speak again, it was with great effort, slow and labored.
The words were not very intelligible and evidently what you
could hear sounded as if I had a mouth full of mashed potatoes.
I did not make much more progress.
After a few months in the hospital's
neurological ward, I was sent to a nursing home. Life at the
home was comprised of eating and sleeping with daily forays
to "occupational therapy," ashtrays and baskets.
I could not see or think well enough to know what I was doing
and was thought to be depressed. It would have been difficult
to be otherwise for I could not see, walk, talk, smell, taste,
hear, or feel well at all. Also, I was hydrocephalic and had
enormous pain in my leg. Was I supposed to be a good, compliant
patient?
Long months of hospital therapy followed.
It proved worthless and worse, confusing. Finally a friend
heard of my plight. He managed to arrange an appointment in
Pennsylvania with Dr. Robert Doman. It was an outside chance,
but at least a chance. In all the months at the hospital with
this gross injury, there had been no mention of the word "brain."
On my appointed day in Pennsylvania,
I was greeted by a group of doctors who not only knew that
something was wrong with me, but also were audacious enough
to suggest that they knew how to make me well. Meantime, back
in Toronto, my friend and angel, Stuart Kent, had organized
a volunteer network for me. The first few weeks were a beehive
of activity at my house. People were learning when to push
or pull my body, apply pressure, put salt and sugar on my
tongue, talk to me in a dark closet, spin me in a chair, gently
tickle my face, etc. I was the focus of all the attention
but a most passive participant. The most vivid recollection
I have of this time is the hydrocephalus starting to break
up as I was rolled on the floor. It felt like chains snapping
in my head, as though I were being released. I would require
volunteers for only a year, until November of 1978.
As I write this it is May, 1984, and
I have waged and won a long private battle. It is the only
world I have known and it is only at this time that I'm aware
of how long it has been in "real" time. I knew that
if I wanted to live a full life, my birthright, once more
that I was doing the only correct thing in the world. Anyway,
there was nowhere to go but up because I was far worse than
dead. From the beginning of my odyssey, I felt that I was
the authority on my body, that I knew more than anyone else
about it instinctively. I had always kept a firm image of
what I would look like when whole again. To do this, I've
had to keep to myself for years. Full reintegration into society
will be problematic but when compared to my problems over
recent years, a piece of cake. Anger has fueled me, anger
as a result of what I could not do, i.e., everything.
In reading this over, I wonder if I
have been too "hazy" about my "problem."
Let me be straightforward. I WAS BADLY BRAIN DAMAGED. I was
alive because my heart was beating, but I have not been able
to live a full and normal life in eight years. What Dr. Doman
writes in his book actually does exist and works. NOTHING
ELSE WORKS. CERTAINLY NOT TIME. NOTHING! Many other doctors
will have you believe that fixing the brain is impossible.
THEY ARE WRONG! These men and women at NACD know about the
brain.
I have had to persevere through massive
obstacles of both medical and public opinion and worse, the
brain injury itself. I've said that re-entering society in
a full way will be difficult, no question. It will be its
own "voyage of discovery" laden with all the emotions
that accompany a returning vet.
This neurological program then is a
long, involved, complicated process, a ball of wax even. There
will, however, never be a manmade computer as complex as the
human brain. I have made these exercises work to my advantage.
They have kept me from the mainstream, and yet I've used that
separateness for private, personal gain. Presently, I've about
perfected the art of being. I'm ready for a little doing in
my life.
Comments from "Dr. Bob" Doman
I first saw Bob Silverman back east
nearly seven years ago. His soaring career as a highly talented
and respected dramatic Canadian actor had been suddenly stopped
when he was struck down by a speeding car in February of 1976.
Bob awoke to a very confusing world where he couldn't see,
hear, taste, smell, feel, or think properly. The medical world
that had saved his legs and his life didn't know what to do
to restore his brilliant but injured brain. They finally relegated
this confused young man to a rest home where he could do nothing
for the remainder of his life. Few amongst us would call that
living. It might better be described as a constant state of
dying.
Sadly, such a story is neither a cruel
fairy tale nor is it a rare incident. In the lives of tens
of thousands of young head injury victims, it is a common
scenario. Many doctors in evaluating their head injury patients,
look on the word "Hope" as a "four letter word."
Yet I wonder, what would the world be like if there was no
hope? In my thirty years as a Board Certified Specialist in
the field of Rehabilitation, I have seen many head injury
and brain injured patients and their families have all hope
crushed from their minds by the attitudes and remarks of many
doctors dealing with them.
These patients are given two alternatives,
spending the rest of their lives in confusion and despair
doing nothing, or trying a program involving hard work over
a period of years with some possibility of hope. Many families
today, as Bob Silverman did seven years ago, are choosing
to at least give our program a try.
When I first saw Bob the only thing
I promised him was hard work. Fortunately, the thought of
hard work didn't frighten him because he has worked very hard
ever since that day. Although he may have had some doubts
about us or some parts of his daily program from time to time,
Bob never completely lost hope in himself and persevered.
When, a few months ago, I asked Bob
to write about his personal struggle to succeed and break
free from the depths of doom and despair, I knew that he couldn't
do so without revealing an important attitude of wanting to
get better more than anything else in the world. I am happy
to be able to tell you that Bob is getting better and better.
He is again acting. He moved to Hollywood and is now reevaluated
at the NACD National office in Redlands, California, where
I have the opportunity to see him every revisit.
Bob was recently nominated for the
Canadian equivalent of an Oscar for Best Supporting Actor
in a film made since his accident. His film credits are far
too numerous to list here. I hope to be able to do so as well
as including his article in my book on Head Injuries that
will be released in the near future.
To update you on Bob Silverman's last visit to NACD in May
of 1984, he is at the top of our profile with above our scale
scores in academics. He has an auditory and visual digit span
of eleven. He is totally right-sided in dominance and we are
now taking the final steps to make both hemispheres more efficient
with bilateral activities including juggling, typing, etc.
Our new goal for Bob Silverman is to
help make him better than he was before the car hit him. We
can hope, as Bob does, for even greater success.
Reprinted from the Journal
of the National
Academy for Child Development
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