On December 19, 2020 while driving to Hilton Head for a week-long beach vacation, Lorraine Johnson and her partner experienced what Lorraine describes as “a day I’ll remember for the rest of my life.” Four hours into their five-hour drive, another vehicle t-boned them, slamming into the front passenger quarter panel of their car at 55 miles per hour and ripping off the hood, rendering it totaled.

“Since we were hit at an angle, we walked away from the collision, and I’m grateful for that,” says Lorraine.

Lorraine’s vehicle after the collision

A Not-So-Great Vacation

Stranded with a trunk full of clothes, food and sports equipment for their week away, they took a taxi for the remaining hour-long car ride.

“The taxi driver said that taking us to our destination and then turning around for his return trip would cost us in the neighborhood of $250. He asked if that was okay. Of course, it was not, but what were we to do?”

Initially, Lorraine felt fine and was happy just to be alive, but within two days, everything changed.

Bizarre and Unrelenting Cognitive Symptoms

Lorraine began feeling angry and frustrated. “I had a hair-trigger temper.” She also had trouble concentrating, severe migraine headaches, was easily startled and couldn’t tolerate bright light or loud noises. “We got rest while in Hilton Head, but it wasn’t a vacation.”

A Post-Concussion Syndrome Diagnosis

A week after the accident, Lorraine sought care as her symptoms began to worsen.

“I was worried that it was PTSD or a concussion from my head being whipped around in a collision at 55 miles per hour. It was clear something was very wrong.”

Lorraine was diagnosed with post-concussion syndrome and was told to rest, stay away from screens, avoid technology and avoid reading. Listening to music was also off limits unless the music was meditative and calming. While she didn’t particularly enjoy meditations, since she also began experiencing insomnia as a result of post-concussion syndrome, the meditations did help her sleep.

“I halfway joked with friends that I was listening to birdies and waves all day, and they laughed. Because I have a hard-driving personality, they knew it had to be driving me crazy.”

Symptoms Linger and Frustration Grows

For four draining months, Lorraine continued to struggle with these symptoms. Eager to get back to some semblance of normalcy, after the first 30 days, she was authorized to return to her work for two hours a day where she was a Wealth Consultant — a very intense profession requiring her to keep up with financial trends, interest rates, stocks and more.

Progress was painfully slow going.

“After working for just two hours a day, I was left with migraines in the upper left quadrant, usually behind my eye — when I was tired, the muscles around my eye twitched and the eyelid drooped. The migraines would not go away for hours even if I stopped what I was doing and went to bed. I could not tolerate scrolling on my computer and had to close my eyes to move between emails or read a document onscreen.” She also could not handle long periods of video screen time and mostly kept her camera off during client meetings.

Not only was Lorraine’s career affected, but she also began to see her crippling symptoms take a toll on her physical health. Proud of her hard-won 25-pound weight loss, she also needed to avoid strenuous exercise. She began gaining weight and losing muscle mass.

“It was depressing. I could not exercise to the degree that I had previously. I could no longer do fitness walking or any strenuous exercise. Also, watching TV was hard, not just because of the motion but because of the changes in light. I couldn’t watch anything action-oriented due to the bright flashes and motion. Anything I would normally do to blow off steam in a frustrating situation, I was told not do.”

WakeMed Concussion Program to the Rescue

Exasperated, Lorraine began looking for additional support.

“All I could find was information about sports concussions and how to get athletes back to competetion. As a middle-aged woman, who wasn’t a serious athlete, I didn’t feel that they were interested in helping me. However, I felt hopeful when I read the WakeMed website. The WakeMed website offered support for more diverse types of patients. I reached out to the WakeMed Concussion Program Director, neuropsychologist, Dr. Paul Cohen who said he would evaluate me though I was four months into symptoms.”

Lorraine Begins to See Results

Dr. Cohen tested Lorraine for memory, general cognition and word finding and confirmed she had post-concussion syndrome. However, he said that WakeMed views concussion as a treatable condition, not one where patients just had to rest and wait it out. He referred her to a specialty neuro optometrist. He also referred her to a WakeMed speech therapist. She began to see results.

“Dr. Cohen told me that they consider concussions to be a treatable illness. He said that rather than just rest my brain, I let myself be exposed to the problematic issue, push past the point of flaring up the symptoms, then rest and recover. He told me that if I completely avoided everything that caused my symptoms to flare, I would not be able to train my brain to get past them.”

The neuro optometrist conducted a comprehensive evaluation that took over an hour. She concluded that the left eye was not tracking with the right eye. This explained the severity of the migraine headaches. Lorraine underwent intensive vision therapy from April 23 to August 25, 2021.

“My headaches are mostly gone. I now rarely have a headache, and it is not nearly as painful. If I have one, with over-the-counter medication, it is gone within an hour.”

WakeMed Speech Therapy

Speech Language Pathologist, Daniel Fenton, of the WakeMed Raleigh Campus Outpatient Rehab conducted Lorraine’s speech therapy. He evaluated her on May 26, and she received treatment from him through July 29. He taught Lorraine methods to compensate until she was fully healed. Speech therapy helped her with concentration, attention and memory. Treatment was intense, but it supported her through her recovery.

“Daniel Fenton had me perform intensive, detailed work. It was very challenging, but it was necessary since my profession required attention to detail. I was starting to be able to think much more quickly and was excited about it, but he said that now I had to slow myself enough to avoid mistakes. It was frustrating, but it worked!”

Lorraine also began physical therapy for neck pain with Melissa Bieber of WakeMed Physical Therapy. As a result of that therapy, her headaches declined even more. She also learned that a headache in the upper left quadrant was related to issues with discs in the back.

Back At It and Better Than Ever

Lorraine is now back at work full time and working on big projects.

“I am enjoying it, and I am back.”

About WakeMed Concussion Program