In looking for a way to stimulate this area shaded in blue, tDCS was recommended. I've been told that area corresponds to the motor and somatosensory cortex.
tDCS is primarily done on your own. Given electricity and a brain, almost anyone can do it. Well, I don't trust almost anyone. tDCS is stimulating the brain with electricity. It stands for Transcranial Direct-Current Stimulation.
First I need to know what it is.
I don't want my head cut open again, so this may be the way to go. Why isn't this closed head technique as studied as Deep Brain Stimulation?
It isn't as available or regulated as the Deep Brain Stimulation is available. The closed-head stimulation, tDCS, is the Wild West of brain stimulation.
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I worried about placement. I wanted to stimulate the motor cortex and most devices were aimed at the front of the brain. Then I stumbled on sports. Athletics target this area.
It looks like the devices used for athletics can be moved to target other brain lobes.
A band such as this, may be positioned to hit the side of the head. I haven't found this particular device for sale. I could only find this picture.
This is looking like the direction I am going. I might be the guinea pig. I'll have to look at university programs now. I'd like skilled people placing this thing on my head.
The
man is answering a question about trading eyesight for IQ. I am doing
another physical skill now, but this is along the same lines that I am
experiencing. My eyesight is good enough to get by. I'm no longer blind
in my right eye and I can see the computer screen.
Currently,
I am working on swallowing. I swallow throughout the day, but it is not
controlled. I cannot eat and have a feeding-tube for nutrition. I
remember dealing with this issue years ago with some toddlers. Parents
were recommended lollipops. I now use a lollipop.
When patients have a rare deadly disease, they need to be in clinical trials.
I didn't have cancer, but it was just as deadly. It was immediate pending death due to placement.
I'm
still here and the anomaly in my brain is gone. I'd say the clinical
trial worked. This was just one issue in a list of many that had to be
resolved. It was probably the most important issue, because I couldn't
do anything if I was dead.
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Since
I immediately wouldn't die, I could think about other issues I had. "I
could think." That meant I was misdiagnosed. I searched around and came
up with Locked-In Syndrome.
I now look like a person recovering from Locked-In Syndrome.
I am writing this from the
'other side of the coin' so to speak. I am writing this with
adaptations I and others made long ago. If not for this clear writing,
it could be said that I was mentally impaired.
First,
just what is it I am doing? I am using the pointer finger of my left
hand to hit and press letter keys to spell words that I organize into
sentences. We then get into paragraph and essay construction that I
learned in grade school.
Typing
on the computer wasn't instant. Before I could hunt out letters on a
keyboard, I had to find them on a communication board. Blinking 'yes/no'
for a letter was many years ago, and is where finding and identifying a
letter began.
Since
I am using only one finger, I must be doing something special to make
capital letters and hit multiple keys, like <ctrl> <alt> <del>. Computers come
with accessibility features built right in. That particular one is
called Sticky Keys. There are many adaptations. This and a lot of
computers call the program Ease of Access. An Occupational Therapist in
Southern California first set it up for me years ago. It was called something else back then. I don't need all
the adaptations now. I just pretty much need the Sticky Keys. (There
used to be an important one called Bouncy Keys. What happens on a
computer if you hold a key down too long? Too long can be a whole
second. I was getting mmmmmaanyyy letters.)
With
identifying letters, came the ability to sit up and move an arm by having lots of therapy. It was a combination of Speech, Occupational, and Physical
therapies. You can't single out one. It's like a pie. If you have a
cherry pie, but only single out the cherries, you have a different
dessert. (Cherries Jubilee)
Now
that I communicate clearly, you see there is no cognitive impairment.
This means communication and cognition are mixed together.
Sure,
a cognitively impaired person won't communicate. What about
communication disabilities, though? People who don't communicate are
being called cognitively impaired. This isn't right.
A
so-called 'cognitively impaired' person who is finally able to
communicate through higher technologies will challenge the system not
set up to handle communicative impairments. This is Locked-In Syndrome. This is what is happening with the man who has been called 'Ghost Boy,' Martin Pistorius.
This essay could be communication. I am still vegetative, although I am able to speak
somewhat. It might take me all day to type this with one finger, but I'm
not going anywhere. Besides, I know stuff you need to know. I doubt that all the people who see this are clairvoyant. They are reading this. Again, no special powers are being used.
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Sign language is just an adapted form of communication. I'm not exhibiting some mystical power. The hand movements aren't "spastic" like previously said. If anything, there is great cognitive skill going on here.
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Years ago, I became familiar with the following categories of intelligence disability:
Click to enlarge.
I'd be classified as "profound" when I first had my bleed. Why? Because we don't know. I'm going to disagree with Google and say profound impairment is impairment so severe, that the subject can't be tested. The definitions I kept getting on Google had numerical IQ scores. To illustrate look at the word "profound."
I am PROFOUND.
I was
(cherry pie)
Now I'm
(Cherries Jubilee)
Obviously, there is clear discrimination of communication. What is my diagnosis? Case closed.
* I have a BA in Psychology and an MA in Special Education. I have worked in disability, children's disability, and mental health. I have guest taught specifically on the topic of children with special needs issues.
I would be recovering from Locked-In Syndrome if that diagnosis had been given. I was thought to be severely
cognitively impaired. I was given a computer and taught how to type.
People were shocked!
Take away this guy's computer n what is he? Vegetative. See how the govt made my decision?
I
wonder what kind of legal problems he's had? He left the country where
he was. (He was in South Africa, but moved to the UK.) I haven't
left...yet.
He is recovering from Locked-In Syndrome. He was thought to be severely cognitively impaired. He was given a computer and taught how to type. People were shocked! Maybe if he had received better treatment, he wouldn't have all those terrible things to say.
I'm still proving to everyone that I am conscious now. Oh the legalities! First of all, is this really me typing this out? Yes, it is. Second, I don't need the lawyer. I want to be conscious. Is it so hard to cross out the word "vegetative" on my file and write conscious? If you need something, write quadriplegia with limited movement.
My
functioning is pretty much the same as this man, but I vocalize now. My speech is
not the greatest, but I am understood. I remember when I moved out of
the hospital and I would lose my voice every other day. I had to take a
breath after every word. My vocal cords were weak. Not anymore, thank
goodness. Now I can hold a conversation without stopping after every
word.
I still have to type longer things like this, but I can make conversation. Only once in a while my daughter has to correct me.
People are taking too long to make me "conscious." Umm... Stanford wanted to do it long ago... back when I had that surgery. It was said back then that it wasn't possible. The surgery I had was ignored. Now it's years later. You better find out what happened.
["Their quantification of white matter reorganization shows long-distance
rewiring in posterior medial cortices, possibly reflecting axonal
sprouting or neurite outgrowth."I think that I had the same sprouting back in 2004 when I had that surgery. It's years later and those sprouts are all grown up. You can then get into "Oh dear! How was she before?" You will be pleasantly surprised.]
Comment: "I wish we knew more about the brain back then." (Back when I had my brain injury less was known than now.)
We
still don't know.
The government cut off my feeding tube supplies in
Dec 2016 and I didn't get it all back on until Feb 2017. People in the
government may have seen YouTube videos and the logic goes, 'you can
talk, therefore you can swallow.' I don't swallow (enough for a test). I
was tested and didn't pass. I never had speech therapy. A therapist
works on swallowing as you go along. They don't usually get this problem. So I taught myself how to speak
enough without swallowing.
I
didn't realize I was supposed to be swallowing until a year ago. Long ago
I did infant intervention as a home teacher. A few kids had problems
with their swallows and I remember the OT recommending lollipops. (Only
speech does swallowing now for those who remember.) My thought was,
'I'll teach myself to swallow.' If those babies could do it then so
could I. So you see me with a lollipop a lot.
There's
more to this brain rehab than just swallowing. I'm still in a coma because I
don't swallow. B.S.!! I wrote this thing while I was in a coma? https://thoughtfulveg.blogspot.com/2013/04/i-want-ass.html This needs to be looked into.
Going
back to when I was first diagnosed as vegetative, I may not have been
vegetative, but totally Locked-In with diminished cognitive capacity. This is why a brain-computer interface and communication software is being researched. The process is slow and has not reached the common household. Some of the beginnings of this research has in the form of 'mind controlled toys,' if you want to look for these, they are now available to the public.
The government's classifying me as in a coma prevents any study of me. "Vegetative" is a coma and one can not give consent. This is a major factor in that slow research. A lot of vegetative could probably answer "yes/no" if given the chance vegetative-state-patient-communication. It wouldn't be instant. The brain injured person has to learn the program.
I was lucky because I had movement in my head at the time. I was in Silicon Valley at the hospital I was at. I could hit a switch with my head that was hooked to a computer for "yes/no." Learning was not instant, and took a few speech therapy sessions. This technology was only available at this particular hospital. It has been 15 years now. I'm seeing the technology more wide-spread, but the typical household isn't there yet. The toys have hit faster.
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By the way, I found a back door to this not being able to study problem- Open Science. Basically, keep it all public.
I have obviously progressed far enough not only to answer yes/no questions, but I can give entire descriptions.
Does anyone else see a problem with the diagnosis of "vegetative"? How does a person give yes/no responses if that person is not conscious?
Maybe I will be compared to Jon Sarkin, but with a worse brain injury (acquired savant syndrome). We both had strokes in the cerebellum of the brain. I don't paint, though. I write.
I
like this video because he describes that he was bending over to get a
golf tee. I was bending over to get garbage off the floor in my car. I had an
accident earlier and the car would have to go in the shop.
I was very close to death. What this woman went through will have to be included.
"Far too often, [vegetative] patients ... are given up for gone, left to
languish in nursing homes where no one bothers with physical therapy or
even to check for glimmers of regained consciousness."It goes on, "That’s at odds with a growing body of research showing that many
patients with no outward signs of awareness retain some degree of
consciousness." http://www.wired.com/wiredscience/2013/02/searching-for-consciousness/
I don't feel like I am "languishing". At times I will get angry and frustrated that growth is slow. That means I am still progressing. I obviously am. The first seven years went by before anyone heard from me, Stroke Connection magazine p. 9.
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A rose didn't struggle to grow where it wasn't supposed to.
You can't see it in this video, but I have a hole in my neck. I used to be
on a ventilator because I couldn't breathe. I kept the breathing tube
for 3 years in my neck after I was taken off the machine. I was told not to be around smoke or risk going back on a machine.
Smoking is out.
Second, I have a g-tube to get nutrition. I do not swallow. I only consistently swallow my saliva.
In
the video, I am holding a medical marijuana lollipop.
(Remember, I only swallow saliva right now. Lollipops just flavor the saliva.)
Marijuana was legalized in California and is making it's way across the
country. Just from this, I foresee a heavy duty cough drop. It would
benefit all people, not just medical marijuana users.
I
have compared the banning of marijuana to the banning of alcohol during
Prohibition. How well did that work? Many OTC liquid medicines have alcohol in them (like liquid Nyquil and Dimetapp).
I see no problem in using medical marijuana as an ingredient in commercial medicine.
There's
no reason marijuana is withheld from people. There is no reason I should be
withheld from people. (I have been. The essays are just shocking.) It all
boils down to beliefs, which include prejudices.
Not
everyone became an alcoholic when alcohol was legalized. Not everyone
will become a pothead with the legalization of marijuana.
