From Having a Severe TBI (Subdural Hematoma with Craniectomy/Cranioplasty, evidence of small contusions a day later and spontaneous resolving SAH) once I snapped back to, from 2 weeks PTA I feel that rehab/neuropsych testing caused more trauma than good. Opinions?

I feel like we as humans, now know just enough about brain injuries to at times do more harm than good. One thing I have learned from my TBI, is how little is known about TBIs and about the human brain in general. Even more so about my specific condition of a subdural hematoma with a large part of my skull off for a week. There are a few perceptive individuals and doctors out there that understand that a TBI is like a fingerprint. However, when I "snapped back to" most of my interactions with medical professionals ranging from STs, PTs, OTs and neurologists were the opposite of contemplative or flexible, in fact they were quite rigid, pessimistic and concrete in their ability to evaluate and predict.

I cannot count the number of times in the rehabilitation hospital that I was informed (or educated according to their notes which are now in my records) that TBIs take a year to heal. Once I snapped to, only a week or so after my cranioplasty, the speech therapy sessions did not go as planned for the STs. The next time they asked me to count backwards from 100 by 7s, and memorize at least 14 details of a BORING paragraph, I stopped to question it first. I asked her, "Aren't these tests somewhat arbitrary? Without a true baseline of me?" She only got offended that I would scrutinize the value of her job, so I'm sure that while I was being perfectly pleasant, that my note for the day was patient was being disagreeable and easy to frustrate due to TBI.

Looking back through my medical records of the facility, there were notes such as, patient shows easy frustration, such as when glasses (which were too big for me and I usually wear contacts) slip to end of nose patient frustratedly grunts as she pushes them back up.

Everything I did or said was not "me" it was due to my TBI. It was medical gaslighting in the worst form. I was told by my father that they told him that I thought I was further along than I was when he disagreed from knowing my former self. My sense of humor, which hadn't changed was instead seen as a loss of filter and self-regulation.

I started to distrust any medical professional to the point that when my ST asked me if it was harder for me to make decisions than previously, instead of answering I looked at her and said, "I feel that is a catch-22 loaded question?" She acted shocked and said, "Why?" I logically answered, "Well, if I answer yes, it will confirm all of your beliefs that I am not as cognitively functional as I actually feel. However, if I answer no, you all will say that I am still unaware of my deficits and have poor insight into my own injury. So there are no right answers here."

I was told that I would not drive or return to my profession of skydiving for a long time, if ever. Well I have been driving since 2 months post surgery and just went on a skydive 2 weeks ago, though with my other injuries I'm nowhere near working in the sport again.

I spent all of that time in the rehab hospital showing people how wrong they were about me and about anything concrete about TBIs in general. However, because I heard nothing other than I was defective for a month, (before transferring to an outpatient rehab where I had STs who actually told me that I was their highest functioning patient ever. She actually bothered to take the tests herself and I scored higher than her on all of them.) I am just now dealing with much of the PTSD and psychological effects from the injury.

Is the depression and anxiety from the injury itself? Perhaps. Or is it PTSD from how I practically woke up into "One Flew Over The Cuckoos Nest" in a hospital that wanted to refuse to discharge me, and even tried to put a bracelet on me to alarm them if I tried to "escape." Is it from being told on a day to day basis, that I was damaged goods who would never get back to functional?

Neuropsychologists need to put themselves into their clients shoes to better decide if they are adding value or hindrance to the healing process. A man in my sport came out of a 6 week coma to become a 6 time world champion. Another, also had a craniotomy with a month of PTA, and went on to win a US championship only a year and a half later. Would they have been able to do these things if they experienced their TBIs now? Or would they have been locked away deemed mentally unstable for thinking that they could accomplish those feats?