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ACQ
uiring knowledge
in
speech
,
language and hearing
, Volume 10, Number 1 2008
33
I
awoke from my coma after several weeks
in hospital; I remember thinking to myself,
what on earth was I doing here.
I was on a motorbiking holiday in Scotland
when I lost control and crashed. I had died
on the roadside as a result of my injuries.
Luckily for me, I was in a group other riders,
some of whom were off duty policemen and
in the first car to happen upon the crash was
a nurse on her way to work. When the
ambulance arrived and I was stabilised, I was
taken to the nearest hospital specialising in
neurological injuries, which was Ninewells
Hospital in Dundee, 45 miles away.
I had broken only my ankle on the initial
impact and the rest of my injuries were
related to being thrown around like a rag
doll. My helmet was shattered like an
eggshell and this gave the doctors their
biggest worry – it was obvious that I had
sustained a head injury.
My accident and coma had taken me back
to zero; I was like a newborn baby in an
adult’s body. I had thirty years of life
experience ahead of me to relearn.
Physically, my recovery was progressing
very well and all my body needed was time to
heal itself. Mentally, my problems were only
just beginning and I realised that there would
A C
onsumer
S
peaks
Steve Pape
doctors and nurses are used to dealing with head injuries and
speech problems, but out in the big wide world it’s a totally
different story. Carol and I had a long journey ahead of us, I
still couldn’t control my tone of voice very well and I still needed
to work on my breathing. Every day with Carol’s help, I
performed my exercises to build up my lungs and throat, and
to control my tone of voice. I had to mentally force myself to
listen to what I was saying and how I was speaking, and if it
didn’t sound right to me then I would correct myself to make
it sound correct. I spoke to people in the manner and tone of
voice that I would like to be talked to; this was the rule I
made for myself to follow when speaking. Talking to old age
pensioners helped, because for them to understand me I had
to enunciate clearly; this helped tremendously with controlling
my voice and tone.
My speech was progressing well until I started work. As I
mentioned earlier, because there were no visible injuries or
bandages people assumed I was fully recovered. What people
couldn’t understand is that my brain was still damaged and
working hard to heal itself. In hospital and at home I didn’t
have to think about much – the biggest decision I had to make
was what to have for lunch, so I didn’t have to strain myself
or do any hard thinking. In the months before I went back to
work both Carol and I thought that I was doing remarkable well
with my recovery. Physically, I was back to normal because
I’d been exercising daily and mentally. I was coping well with
be many problems ahead. People think I’m joking when I tell
them how badly damaged I was, but because there are no
bandages or physical disabilities people assumed I was fully
recovered.
Because of the head injury I had sustained, speech therapy
was included as part of my rehabilitation program. The speech
therapy was teaching me how to regain control of all the
different systems used for speech, with various breathing and
oro-facial exercises I was progressing well with my speech. I
left hospital with a slight speech problem, so Carol (my wife)
and I made some outpatient appointments to continue with
the speech therapy. It was at home, away from hospital that I
realised how much of a problem I still had. In hospital, the