Zmudy Traumatic Brain Injury Recovery
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Zmudy Traumatic Brain Injury Recovery
The purpose of these notes is to:
1) Tell you what happened
2) Tell you what I need to do about it and how much it costs
3) Tell you how it has impacted me
4) Tell you about my commitment to pay it forward to the next person with a TBI in the future.
What happened:
Many of my friends, family, and loved ones may not know that on Jun 9, 2017 I got hit in the head very extremely hard and got a Traumatic Brain Injury (TBI).
At this time, for various reasons I cannot reveal exactly what I was doing when I got the TBI, or where I was doing it. But it was not anything too out of the ordinary. I will share in good time.
***If you are one of the few who know what happened, please don’t discuss it here.
What I need:
Functional Neurology Intensive Week = $6,250.
For about a year I attended no less than five medical appointments per week for things like Physical Therapy, Occupational Therapy, Speech Therapy, Neurology, Chiropractic, Vision Therapy, Physical Medicine, and Functional Neurology. After the first year, the number has fluctuated between approximately two to four appointments per week.
My experience has been that all of the appointments in the various disciplines would not have been effective without Functional Neurology being a weekly part of the picture over the last year, and vice versa. What I have learned is that there are 17 sets of reflexes in the human body that develop between pre-natal and adulthood. My Doctor of Functional Neurology has sequentially gone through physical tests and interventions for each set of reflexes and has been able to determine exactly which parts of my brain are not connecting with the other parts. For example, if a weakness appears in Speech Therapy, we use an approach where I do activities that elicit the weakness and keep building up the amount of time or practice attempts for the activity (similar to how you would approach working out in a gym). Functional Neurology goes about another way and says, “this weakness is only there because a certain part of the brain is not connecting right with the other parts.” It is a root-cause analysis followed by direct physical interventions.
I have now moved to a point where the next obvious thing for me to do is the Intensive Week at the Midwest Functional Neurology Center in Minnetonka, Minnesota. Functional Neurology is an approach that uses specifically designed treatment processes to enhance the overall function of the brain. While my Functional Neurology Doc is awesome, we have virtually exhausted his educational and knowledge base and he has referred me to the National Level Center so I can gain access to all the treatment modalities they have available.
I have determined that the cost of the intensive week plus travel, food, lodging and fees for the fund raiser will be $6,250. This is $5,250 for the treatment center and $1,000 for travel, lodging, food, and GoFUndMe fees.
How it has impacted me:
This process has been as slow as sitting and watching a plant grow. It took about the first four months to be able to take a shower, get dressed, make breakfast, and do dishes in less than three to four hours. All along I have had a series of rotating festivities like vision problems, proprioception and balance problems, migraine headaches, intense nausea, seeing light flashes and light shapes at night (eyes opened or closed), ringing in the ears, the world always moving around like I am on a boat, feelings of motion when I am still, and the right and left sides of my body not feeling physically the same, to name a few. I have lots of patience and sense of humor so those things have been very helpful for me.
Many, many things are missing from my life. About 90% of the activities I would normally do are currently off limits. Have you seen my MINI ADVENTURES on Facebook? This is what those are all about. I started my Mini Adventures in order to work on practicing getting out and about and to help push all my abilities and comfort zones. They are wonderful and are certainly something I would want to do anyway, and I encourage all of you to try it, too! So now you know.
Since Jun 9, 2017 I have been on medical leave from my teaching job as s university professor. For the 2017-18 school year I was on full medical leave. During fall 2018 I taught one class as an experiment. The class itself went pretty well, but the rest of my life did not go well due to the overload of teaching the class. During spring semester 2019 I had an assignment of six hours per week doing scholarly/research work. It seemed to be a good match for where I’m at. Fall 2019 I am teaching one class.
The medical leave has caused a situation where I am eligible for only 66% of my salary. While I am extremely grateful for this, the rest of my life did not reduce in cost to match my salary. For this reason, I do not have the funding I need to pursue my Functional Neurology intensive week at the Minnesota Functional Neurology Center. Attending during December 2019 or early in 2020 would be the ideal timing. Here is the link to the Center, FYI: https://mnfunctionalneurology.com/
I was just recently told by one of my dear friends that for as long as she has known me I have put lots of good into the world. Now it is ok to ask the world for some help.
My Commitment:
My commitment and promise is that in the future, and as soon as possible and I am able, I will fully fund the intensive week at the Functional Neurology Center for the next person down the line with a TBI. Believe me, they are way more common that you might think and I have met many folks with TBIs along the way in this journey.
Thank you for reading. Love and Many Blessings,
Mark
The purpose of these notes is to:
1) Tell you what happened
2) Tell you what I need to do about it and how much it costs
3) Tell you how it has impacted me
4) Tell you about my commitment to pay it forward to the next person with a TBI in the future.
What happened:
Many of my friends, family, and loved ones may not know that on Jun 9, 2017 I got hit in the head very extremely hard and got a Traumatic Brain Injury (TBI).
At this time, for various reasons I cannot reveal exactly what I was doing when I got the TBI, or where I was doing it. But it was not anything too out of the ordinary. I will share in good time.
***If you are one of the few who know what happened, please don’t discuss it here.
What I need:
Functional Neurology Intensive Week = $6,250.
For about a year I attended no less than five medical appointments per week for things like Physical Therapy, Occupational Therapy, Speech Therapy, Neurology, Chiropractic, Vision Therapy, Physical Medicine, and Functional Neurology. After the first year, the number has fluctuated between approximately two to four appointments per week.
My experience has been that all of the appointments in the various disciplines would not have been effective without Functional Neurology being a weekly part of the picture over the last year, and vice versa. What I have learned is that there are 17 sets of reflexes in the human body that develop between pre-natal and adulthood. My Doctor of Functional Neurology has sequentially gone through physical tests and interventions for each set of reflexes and has been able to determine exactly which parts of my brain are not connecting with the other parts. For example, if a weakness appears in Speech Therapy, we use an approach where I do activities that elicit the weakness and keep building up the amount of time or practice attempts for the activity (similar to how you would approach working out in a gym). Functional Neurology goes about another way and says, “this weakness is only there because a certain part of the brain is not connecting right with the other parts.” It is a root-cause analysis followed by direct physical interventions.
I have now moved to a point where the next obvious thing for me to do is the Intensive Week at the Midwest Functional Neurology Center in Minnetonka, Minnesota. Functional Neurology is an approach that uses specifically designed treatment processes to enhance the overall function of the brain. While my Functional Neurology Doc is awesome, we have virtually exhausted his educational and knowledge base and he has referred me to the National Level Center so I can gain access to all the treatment modalities they have available.
I have determined that the cost of the intensive week plus travel, food, lodging and fees for the fund raiser will be $6,250. This is $5,250 for the treatment center and $1,000 for travel, lodging, food, and GoFUndMe fees.
How it has impacted me:
This process has been as slow as sitting and watching a plant grow. It took about the first four months to be able to take a shower, get dressed, make breakfast, and do dishes in less than three to four hours. All along I have had a series of rotating festivities like vision problems, proprioception and balance problems, migraine headaches, intense nausea, seeing light flashes and light shapes at night (eyes opened or closed), ringing in the ears, the world always moving around like I am on a boat, feelings of motion when I am still, and the right and left sides of my body not feeling physically the same, to name a few. I have lots of patience and sense of humor so those things have been very helpful for me.
Many, many things are missing from my life. About 90% of the activities I would normally do are currently off limits. Have you seen my MINI ADVENTURES on Facebook? This is what those are all about. I started my Mini Adventures in order to work on practicing getting out and about and to help push all my abilities and comfort zones. They are wonderful and are certainly something I would want to do anyway, and I encourage all of you to try it, too! So now you know.
Since Jun 9, 2017 I have been on medical leave from my teaching job as s university professor. For the 2017-18 school year I was on full medical leave. During fall 2018 I taught one class as an experiment. The class itself went pretty well, but the rest of my life did not go well due to the overload of teaching the class. During spring semester 2019 I had an assignment of six hours per week doing scholarly/research work. It seemed to be a good match for where I’m at. Fall 2019 I am teaching one class.
The medical leave has caused a situation where I am eligible for only 66% of my salary. While I am extremely grateful for this, the rest of my life did not reduce in cost to match my salary. For this reason, I do not have the funding I need to pursue my Functional Neurology intensive week at the Minnesota Functional Neurology Center. Attending during December 2019 or early in 2020 would be the ideal timing. Here is the link to the Center, FYI: https://mnfunctionalneurology.com/
I was just recently told by one of my dear friends that for as long as she has known me I have put lots of good into the world. Now it is ok to ask the world for some help.
My Commitment:
My commitment and promise is that in the future, and as soon as possible and I am able, I will fully fund the intensive week at the Functional Neurology Center for the next person down the line with a TBI. Believe me, they are way more common that you might think and I have met many folks with TBIs along the way in this journey.
Thank you for reading. Love and Many Blessings,
Mark
Organizer
Mark H Zmudy
Organizer
Duluth, MN
