The light at the end of the tunel...

In 2009 my life was rocked when I suffered a traumatic brain injury.  One morning I woke up and knew something was severely wrong with my body and brain.  I couldn't walk or talk properly for 3 months.  I was bed-ridden and wouldn't leave the house.  My voice went from sounding like a stroke victim to one day waking up with a Swedish accent.  Eventually Italian, British and over time I developed 14 very distinct different accents.  The accents would pop up with no rhym or reason and last for 1 minute, an hour, a day, weeks or months.  I started suffering seizures, brain zaps, tremors, night terrors and various other things were happening to my body and brain that were not normal. 

Doctors treated all my symptoms seperatly, sending me to different specialists, doing tests and told me in 6 months everything would turn back to normal.  It is now 2014 and normal for me is a British Accent.

I have been diagnoised with a very rare syndrome that under 100 persons in the world currently have.  Foreign Accent Syndrome.  Yep, it's a real diagnosis.

Living with something like this is a truely wonderous thing.  I meet new people every day.  A simple grocery store trip to get milk turn into 5 or 6 people asking me where I am from because I sound British.  Even people from abroad ask me when I moved here.  It's amazing how authentic I sound to people.  I had to make up business cards to hand out to people as it takes to long to explain my story, I have groceries to buy! 

So what happened to me?  A doctor instructed me to stop one medication and start another rather than titrating (weening) down from one onto another.   It is believed by some of my current doctors that I fell into a small coma.  Additionally it is believed I suffered major seritonin withdrawl.  The FAS (Foreign Accent Syndrome) comes in by having decreased blood flow to the left frontal lobe of your brain where language is controlled.  That is where my damage is..."allegedly".  I am using careful words for obvious reasons.  

For close to 5 years I have lived with FAS as an every day part of my life.  You wouldn't think that something so fun as a daily British Accent would be something hard.  Don't get me wrong...it's fun, more often than not.  Joking that my husband goes to bed every night with a different woman...that never gets old!  But I have faced trials like loosing people close to me because they didn't believe my injury was real.  Strangers making fun of me....in front of my children.  Being called a foreigner when you were born and raised here.  Being asked if I can speak English.  Those are a few of the nice things.  Rather than be bitter I took the higher road and used the adversity as a learning experience and taught my children in real situations how NOT to treat people.  How adults have to be put in "time out" sometimes.  We don't judge people by how they look, sound, walk or talk.  The old adage "don't judge a book by it's cover" has new meaning to me.

My children dubbed my old voice my "mommy voice".  In the beginning when the voice changes first started happening they kept asking when my mommy voice was coming back.  It is a hard thing to think that the voice you are born with, said "I do" with, said "I'm your mama" at the birth of your children is gone.  My pitch, tone, cadence are all different.  Even now 3 years later it is something I struggle with.

But for all the sadness that seems to be said above I am greatful.  My heart and mind have been lifted to seeing things with new eyes.  When you come so close to loosing everything you appreciate the small things so much more.  I stop and I smell the roses.  I firmly believe that God has a plan for all of us in this world.  For me, this was his plan, the path he laid for me.  Crazy as it is.  But that is me, out of the ordinary.  I have never done things normal.  Normal isn't fun.

 So I get to be the brain injured, British sounding gal that gets to spread the word about FAS and tell people my story.  Educating people to do their homework on being their own advocate when prescribed medications and doing your own homework when it comes to your health and well-being. In my case I was miss-diagnoised.  Given double the recommeded maximum dosage of medication and taken off cold-turkey.  Not a great combination.  It ultimately caused an injury but it didn't take my "voice" away or my spirit.

I hope you found this blog informative and worth while to read.  It is not easy to put your personal story out there on the web for all to see.  Share the link with someone who may be suffering from an injury as well.  It may give them a light at the end of their tunnel.