My father asked if I was smarter. He already knew I was smart. -Angela
I know people click on "Phenomenal Recovery" looking for reference to me.
There is some but not a lot. It's more about that woman, Kate Allatt, in the second video. She had full recovery of speech and ambulation when it was thought that a stroke left her in a coma. She ended up being diagnosed as Locked-In Syndrome.
If I was diagnosed Locked-In Syndrome, I might also be saying the same. I wasn't though. I was given vegetative, PVS.
If I was diagnosed Locked-In Syndrome, I might also be saying the same. I wasn't though. I was given vegetative, PVS.
Some playing around with diagnosis has happened and I am now semi-vegetative. "Semi" takes care of this talking thing.
I don't say I've had a phenomenal recovery. I'm not done recovering yet. My diagnosis is still "vegetative." I know it has been 17 years since my stroke, but I continue to make progress.
This is Orlando Serrell. He was hit with a baseball, and developed amazing memory.
He continues to improve.
He continues to improve.
The person above had a brain injury, does something amazing, and continues to have progress. Those same criteria fit me. I continue to have progress (but it is called recovery, years later). This man has savant syndrome, though, and I don't. I am in an open-eye coma.
Savant syndrome wasn't ever a recognized disorder in the scholarly community. You can't look it up in the DSM or any other diagnostic manual. However, it was recognized in the media.
In 1988, the movie Rain Man was released
about a man with Autism who had
Savant Syndrome.
I do something different. I talk, write, and get better. Talking and writing don't sound amazing until I tell you that I am in a coma. I'm vegetative, so it's a coma with my eyes open.
That doesn't sound right. It isn't.
People don't talk in comas. What was thought to be a coma was really a pseudo-coma. No wonder why that woman was reclassified as Locked-In Syndrome.
People don't talk in comas. What was thought to be a coma was really a pseudo-coma. No wonder why that woman was reclassified as Locked-In Syndrome.
There may have been a coma start. At some point there is transition to a pseudo-coma. In blind and low-vision persons there is no eye gaze. I am low vision.
He says to use eye gaze.
________________________
I don't talk and write in a coma, giving me Savant Syndrome, Acquired. People are amazed that I am so smart, though.
I already was smart!
I left high school when I was 16 and started college. I got my AA at age 18 when my peers graduated from high school. The following year I got my BA.
This is interesting, as in woo-woo. My BA is in Psychology and I use it. I know diagnoses. Here's more woo. At 24 I got an MA in Early Childhood Special Education. I specifically worked with the child who had my current problem.
________________
I will go on to say yes, Savant Syndrome, but it is congenital. The cause of my brain bleed was congenital and it is very possible that it bled in utero while my mother was pregnant.
________________
Talking and writing are splinter skills.
The bleed wiped out everything. Development was done again.
Two years after my stroke, my playground was cleared out and cleaned. I had neural repair surgery. My cerebellum was damaged in the prior bleed and it was cleaned and cleared of all damage. I played and grew on my new playground.
Brain growth had to happen all over again. There was a second development, but it started with the splinter skills of the typical child development. It used what was already there.
Talking and writing are left over from the first time (development). As I remember, test scores on an annual achievement test were in the 99th percentile for verbal and non-verbal. The test also covered quantitative and spatial. These scores were high, but not as high. The first two were my strengths. (I don't know how far back CAT testing is saved, but scores come from there.)
"Savant syndrome, both in the congenital and acquired types, provides compelling evidence of remarkable brain plasticity"
This is that getting better I do. Here's your Savant Syndrome.
Talking and writing is where current savant syndrome will and somewhat has occurred. Is it possible to see how much brain growth has occurred since surgery? This may be beyond current scanning methods. This will let you know, though, if there is anything left to expect.
This is introspective. It has to go to a trained and licensed professional. It is officially written that I am vegetative. I am currently in a coma and can have no influence on my current diagnosis.
Am I smarter? I could be, but I don't feel it.
Am I smarter? I could be, but I don't feel it.
Updated 11/30/2019
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