I recently had the chance to see the movie, Concussion. The one about the doctor who looked into all of these NFL players who were experiencing mood swings, personality changes, emotional instability and a whole host of other symptoms after their playing careers were done. Several of them died tragically and their brains were studied and found to be showing signs of Alzheimer’s disease even though they were very young. Turns out these guys had suffered numerous tiny traumatic brain injuries (TBI). The movie was good. Definitely worth seeing. The point is that people, not just football players, can also experience these injuries in everyday life.
The movie ended before they got to the best part though. These TBI’s cause these myriad of problems. So what do you do about it? In order to answer this question you have to know what caused the problem at a deeper level. It has been studied and the mechanisms of these injuries and subsequent brain changes are understood. The good news is that something can be done about it. Basically, your brain chemistry changes. The optimal environment must be restored in order to make the problem better or, in some cases, restore function completely. There are things called neurosteroids and neuroactive steroids that run the brain. These brain steroids are part of a cascade of hormones that eventually end up as growth hormone, testosterone, estrogen, thyroid hormone and cortisol. Let’s see. What are some common symptoms or hormone imbalance? Mood swings, personality changes, low energy, low motivation, anxiety, depression, low libido, weight gain, loos of lean muscle mass, fatigue are just a few. There is no anti depressant gland in the body. If you are on one of these type medications and they aren’t working for you then maybe it is time to dig a little deeper.
So, if you suspect that you have had a concussion and have experienced any personality changes…even little ones…it may be worth talking to someone. Unfortunately, this is not mainstream medicine and oftentimes your primary care doctor or specialist will look at you funny if you start asking to have such things looked into. This is science based medicine. I urge you to look at medical research. It is at your fingertips. We in the medical profession really do shake our heads when people start talking about what they read on Google. You really do have to weed through a lot of garbage to read something legitimate. Google Scholar has these types of legitimate medical research on just about any subject you can name. There are thousands of research articles on TBI and the long term effects on the brain. For instance, if you will go to https://scholar.google.com/scholar?hl=en&as_sdt=0%2C19&as_ylo=2017&q=tbi+and+testosterone&oq=tbi+and+te and you will find 1500 + articles written about TBI and testosterone since 2017.
The whole point is to not give up looking for answers for a problem you or someone you know is currently having. Depression, anxiety, mood swings, personality changes, memory problem, fatigue, loss of libido are all problems that may have their origins in something that happened years ago. That car accident when you were 19. Multiple hits to the head while playing sports, having major surgery are all examples of things that can cause a disruption of your brain’s normal chemistry. These things can have long term effects on your brain function. They can also show up many years later
