TBI: It's Like Being A Newborn All Over Again!

Brain Recovery Coach, Nathalie Kelly draws from her previous work teaching new parents about the needs of a newborn baby and draws a parallel with the needs of a person with a brain injury or concussion. http://www.BrainRecoveryCoach.com See the full transcript below. 0:00hello my beautiful and courageous friends 0:03it's Nathalie Kelly the TBI coach here now you know before my brain injury 0:08I was the director of a pregnancy and childbirth and parenting center in San Francisco and I taught thousands of new parents how to take care of their newborn babies. after my brain injury I realized that brain-injured people and newborn babies have so much in common 0:28so today I want to talk to you about what we can learn about how to be in 0:33these new bodies from newborn babies 0:36now I made this video of two years ago 5 years into my injury and one of the cool 0:43things about that as you can see how much I've progressed 0:47just in the last two years so I hope you enjoy this video because we've got a very special guest for you newborn babies and people with brain injuries have a lot in common 1:34a growing brain requires a tremendous amount of energy and there's a huge need 1:41for sleep to restore that energy during sleep the brain will process all the 1:47information is just absorbed and sleep is like hitting the reset button for the brain and a new baby 1:56usually won't go more than two hours without sleeping and eating that reset button a new baby will sleep 16 to 17 hours a day 2:06so take a lesson from Canon here and sleep as much as you need to just the way he does now the brain is part of the central nervous system 2:19babies are born with an immature nervous system and if you have an injured brain 2:26you have been injured nervous system messages may have a hard time traveling 2:33from the brain to the rest of the body smoothly and processing information 2:38takes a tremendous amount of work by information I don't just mean ideas and 2:45intellectual information I mean what you see and what you hear and what might 2:51have been previously to a healthy brain very simple visual and auditory input 4:01what a brain injured person needs is exactly what babies and you probably 4:07wouldn't to enter a room where there was a newborn baby with lots of noise and boisterous energy 4:13you probably would slow yourself down lower the tone of your voice and maybe even slow your speech down both you and can adhere need a very calm and quiet environment canon also needs good nutrition and hydration so do you eating well is essential part of growing a new brain and just as you wouldn't 4:41give this little guy processed foods or put coca-cola in his baby bottle or gin for that matter 4:49likewise you should be feeding yourself nutrient-dense wholesome foods whole and especially the 5:04healthy fats which are what the brain is largely comprised of 5:14maybe like an in here is going to need structure and routine in order to begin 5:21to orient himself to his body and to the rhythm of a day and so do you so make yourself 5:29natural and stick to it as best you can most babies don't sleep for 5:35more than a few hours at a time when every day or night time 5:51structure is going to help that process every brain injuries different but likely just 7:02like little can hear you gradually move from one stage to the next barely 7:13noticing a change from week to week until you look back over time and just 7:20as you can't push a baby to grow up any faster than it's going to grow up 7:25you can't push your brain to heal any faster either 7:31in fact if you try to stress about will just further impede your brain function 7:36so be patient with yourself 7:40it would be absurd to ask this little guy to read write or walk or talk until 7:48the time is right and similarly it might take you awhile 7:58more maybe and you're starting all over again so be patient with yourself and celebrate every little baby step and every bit of progress 8:08the same way a loving parent and celebrate every milestone of its 8:15precious little baby just like can hear you two will get more and more capable