I Pity the Fool

I'm not mad. I am only stating the obvious. You can then believe what you want.
 

The brain is amazing. It does have the ability to rewire. It has other abilities, too. Things are currently being learned about that take years for acceptance.

People ask about my brain. Here's this...

"What happens is that there is an injury to one part of the brain—most often the left hemisphere. And there is what I called a recruitment of still-intact brain tissue elsewhere. The brain seeks to correct the imbalance and will find an undamaged area, most often in the right hemisphere. There is then rewiring to that new area, and then there is the release of dormant potential, which can be at sometimes an astronomical level. So it's the three R's: recruitment of still-intact tissue, rewiring, and the release of whatever capacity is there." http://www.vice.com/read/whats-new-in-the-field-of-savant-syndrome-research-611

This is all under savant syndrome. Did anyone think to look there? In my case no. I am typing with my left hand. There must have been " still-intact brain tissue elsewhere" in the right hemisphere. It was either missed or the tissue grew on it's own. It's more likely that the tissue was missed. 

Remember I said there were amazing things like rewiring? Well, there is also something called neurogenesis. They probably both happened in me. I'm not to be studied or anything else. I was listed as permanently being in a coma. I'm not ever to be conscious. The government believes I am still unconscious. Pity.

Neurogenic Therapy

Is Angela's Rest Technique (ART), http://thoughtfulveg.blogspot.com/2011/06/angelas-rest-technique-or-art-of.html, neurogenesis? It basically puts movement where there was none. And it does so by working on the brain.
 

Now in order for this to work, there shouldn't be any spinal cord damage. Also, there shouldn't be any physical impairment in the desired area. Something like a straight forward brain injury would work best.
 

I'm thinking that the area that does not move is not paralyzed, but most likely needs re-wiring. "But there's no movement at all." Well then, take and move it. Train it. Use your good hand to move it, or have somebody else do it.
 

I don't remember which, I believe it was a video, Edward Taub described micro movements that we couldn't see were behind his Constraint Induced Movement Therapy.  (CIMT). This would take that theory one step further. I'm proposing there doesn't need to be any movement at all. Not even micro movements. I believe all there needs to be is a working brain and working parts. The desired movement had to exist prior to injury, thereby laying the foundation for the new movement. (The movement isn't actually new. Just getting it done is.)
 

The reason ART works is the brain is constantly bombarded with natural information, but in a way that the brain has to deal with it. ART uses body weight and gravity. Those forces cause the brain to re-wire/make neuropathways to deal with the information coming in (gravity pulling body weight against an area that does not have neuropathways). Also, the involved area must not be impeded such as Spinal Cord Injury or physical deformity.
 

Because gravity is involved, it also develops proprioception. The person would develop their sense of their body in space. http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/proprioception
 

Again, I will use myself as the example. I have pretty much been doing ART and there is now movement. Instead of it being a miracle, the blueprints were already there, it just needed wiring. The basis for movement was there as I was able to perform the desired action prior to injury.
 
Because this process works on the brain, quality of movement would continue to improve. The neuropathways involved would become stronger. If this is used after movement starts, movement will improve. I also recommend adding physical therapy at this time. (I continue to do this and the quality of the movement improves).

Give A Little Bit

That neuropathway I'm making, it's the whole thing. So, making it and wiring it. My body made it and now it needs to be guided through the wiring process. That would be two processes. First is making it, then using it. It's actually been seen to happen in special education-a student "doesn't get it" until years later. The people that notice are usually the student and family. School personnel may not. They may not be the originators. But records exist. There's something called an IEP.

With me doing all these things years later, I kept thinking of a kid of about 15 years old a while back. He would walk with assistance from the living room to his bedroom in a care home. His parents probably started in Kindergarten by writing walking as a goal. He probably had to wear special leg splints and have regular physical therapy. Every year, that goal would be looked at and the daily activities increased in difficulty. The staff may be different, but the paper is the same.

And so it has been with me. People will look and think, "she's getting it!" Really though, it's not a miracle. I just had a goal years ago, and did daily activities (this included therapy, exercises, etc.) that progressively got harder. "Progressively getting harder" would sometimes be a very minute change. A lot of times it would be no change at all-just maintain and get used to it. It was just a little bit. So, give a little bit...

Making A Neural Pathway

I have a BA in Psychology and an MA in Special Education so I guess I'm somewhat qualified to do this. Nobody else has been through this either. Somehow, I've managed to keep all my knowledge, it's just taken some time to get my physical ability there. This time, though, has allowed me to see a process.

There has been talk of re-wiring, and having experienced that, yes. But there is something else. When I say I'm "making a new neural pathway", I am. There is something I noticed with on-line brain injury groups: re-wiring happens closer to the injury date. I'll say during the first year. But it doesn't stop there. The wondrous brain continues to grow. So yes, it would make new neural pathways. I noticed another thing with these groups: the longer it's been since injury, the easier things get. I then thought of my Special Education background, it may take 10 years, but a student might get it. I then look at me, I'm not miraculously getting skills back, I'm providing myself intervention to eventually learn new skills. For years I did early intervention, and learned a few things. It has been very limited, though, due to my physical condition. In so doing, I'm providing my brain the opportunity to make a new neural pathway.

So I continue to make new neural pathways. I would venture to say then, ANYONE with a working brain has the ability to grow and change. They have the ability to make new neural pathways. This process of making one takes a lot longer. Educators see it all the time, and special educators deal with the problems of it. It will take the typical person 18 years to complete the education system and most of their neuronal growth. It wouldn't be that hard to say it might take another 18 years for a brain injury recovery. A person may be good enough to pass in a few years, but he/she should be given the same amount of time afforded to a child who is making new neural pathways.

UPDATED 7/26/2012

What Is A Sneeze

I didn't realize I hadn't sneezed until I did again. I then figured sneezing must be part of the re-wiring that the rest of my brain was doing. You see, I had a terrible brain injury. Funny, but I couldn't ever remember a sneeze being described in terms of wiring.

So what is a sneeze? It's a pulse of energy traveling a circuit. An irritant (like dust, pollen, or a feather) stimulates a nerve ending-the beginning of this circuit. An impulse, or burst of energy, travels the pathway of wiring. If successful, that's it. If not, then it happens again.