Everyday objects broke my brain.

I remember thinking that only a catastrophic accident or dramatic moment could change your life, or where people expect to hear the words “brain injury.” I have learned that this is not always true. For me, it was my car door, gym equipment, and the wind that left me living in an invisible and permanent disruption to my life.

My first year of teaching started in September 2024, the defining moment as you are figuring out what kind of teacher you want to be. In my case, it was to be a French educator, promoting the use of our country’s second language across our program. This was always something that I was passionate about, and through my own experiences of working in Quebec City with an international French summer camp, I thought that this was what I was destined to do.

Then, October came, and so did the ice in my hometown of Labrador City. I slipped on an icy parking lot outside of Walmart. I was reaching for my car door and my foot slid. My head slammed into the frame. I knew right away something was wrong, but I convinced myself I was being dramatic. After all, who gives themselves a concussion with their car door?

It took a lot of convincing, but after becoming physically ill and seeing double and triple versions of singular objects, I went to the doctor. At the hospital, I was told it was “only” a minor concussion and that I would be normal within a couple of weeks. I was told to “rest, relax, and take it easy.” I was told that people get minor concussions all the time and go back to normal once their symptoms settle. I believed them. Everyone that I knew who had a concussion from sports was still standing to tell the tale. I had never even heard of someone having prolonged concussion symptoms. I left the hospital that day with no idea that the old version of my life was already gone.

The symptoms simply never stopped. They followed me everywhere, into every store where the crowds overstimulated me to the point of tears. Into every conversation where I knew what I wanted to say but the words just wouldn’t come out. Into my own classroom, where suddenly teaching in my second language to the newest generation of French speakers was impossible because I could barely hold a thought in English. I pushed through and learned to function instead of living.

Months after my initial injury, I had returned to the gym to try and feel myself again. Before my injury, I was at the gym five or six times a week and I had decided that this was the way to getting back on track to feeling normal. It was March 2025 when I was attaching my ankle to the cable machine (for an exercise I had done hundreds of times before) that I hit my head again. This time, I saw blood. I instantly got sick and the weight room suddenly started spinning in all directions. All I could think about was that I couldn’t do this again. 

I was less reluctant to go to the hospital this time, especially with a gash on my head. I was again told that recovery would come with time, the same sentence of “rest, relax, and take it easy” echoed through the examination room in the emergency department. I believed them again, because who gets a second concussion less than six months after their first one? I went home and once again, my symptoms did not fade. If anything, they were worse than before. I was struggling even more to function in my day-to-day life. Words became more frequently forgotten, ten minutes in a grocery store would give me a migraine that lasted for hours, standing up from the couch would even send me into a dizzy spell that seemingly had no end. Something more was going on here, and unfortunately, this was only the beginning of my new life.

The words “brain injury” are not really what you expect to hear in a doctor’s office at 23 years old. But that was the case for me. The doctor explained to me that in rare cases, concussion symptoms lasted for weeks, months, and even years. There was nothing they could offer for me to help heal, no therapies in Labrador that would help me learn to live with my symptoms. I was simply given the label of post-concussion syndrome and sent on my way to figure out what my new life would look like.

Post-concussion syndrome reduced my life to survival. I was no longer living. I was forcing myself to function with no real idea of when I would be “normal” again.

At the end of the school year in June 2025, I moved out of Labrador and to the island where my family had relocated after retirement. It was over the summer that I started vestibular rehabilitation and occupational therapy. I was finally seeing a future without symptoms. The exercises and treatment plans were working just as they were supposed to, and while the progress was slow and steady, there was still progress; something I had not seen up until this point. I felt optimistic and like I would finally be able to live my life like I had planned. I was 24 at this point and anxious to get back to a regular way of life that didn’t revolve around my concussion symptoms.

I got a job teaching grade 7 in Carbonear that started in September 2025. On a windy day in October, a little over a month since starting at my new school, I went out to buy Jolly Ranchers for my students as a prize for a game that I had planned for the following week. As I leaned into my car to put the Jolly Ranchers away, the wind slammed my door shut and closed my head into the frame. I blacked out, I got sick again, and I cried. Not just because I was in pain, but from the grief of knowing that I was starting over for the third time in just twelve months.

Teaching has become nearly impossible. Explaining to students that loud class periods feels like standing directly in front of concert speakers, or explaining to colleagues that the fluorescent lights of a school building feels like having a flashlight in my eyes is exhausting and isolating. I eventually had to relocate to St. John’s, as driving an hour each way to get back and forth to my therapies twice a week was harming me more than it was helping me. It was an adjustment I made for myself. The email that my transfer was confirmed came in on a Friday afternoon at 3:30, after the students had gone home for the day. It stated that I would be transferring to my new school the following Monday morning, meaning I did not have time to say goodbye or to announce my departure in person. 

It was a difficult weekend as I sent an email with an explanation to the parents of the students I was just getting to know, took what was mine out of my classroom, and moved my entire life to St. John’s in under 48 hours. Given the high emotions of the circumstances, there were some different perspectives coming through questioning my professionalism and asking me if I had even considered the students I was leaving behind. I spent the next several weeks wondering if I had done the right thing and if I had truly hurt my students in the way that people were telling me I had. The reality was, however, that my injury created a work environment beyond what my recovery could support, and I hope that one day others will see it in the same way.

This is not how I imagined my twenties. The future I once planned out no longer exists. My passion for teaching and helping students to develop the same passion for the French language is no longer something that seems feasible. Remembering simple details and words in English has become a struggle in my daily life. The version of myself I once saw as an educator for the future generations no longer exists after three concussions and a post-concussion syndrome diagnosis.

My experiences may be unique to me, but this reality is shared by many. I have decided to use my experiences in a new way to help others, with my new goal being to work with people living with brain injuries. I now aspire to be the person who tells them that they are not weak, not imagining what they are going through, and not failing because “normal” never came back. While I will no longer be teaching in the conventional sense, I will be helping a whole new group of individuals with whom I share similar experiences. I will be using my competencies as a teacher to help educate others in the same situation as I once found myself in, helping them to understand that nothing they are doing is wrong, and that recovery is possible. 

As I return to school to pursue my new dream of becoming a physiotherapist in vestibular rehabilitation (like those that are continuing to help me through my new realities as I recover from three concussions in twelve months), I can only hope to use my own experiences as an example that your life doesn’t end because the path you had planned out is no longer feasible with your new realities. You simply adapt, adjust, and move forward with new goals and new perspectives on life.

Brain injuries force people to quietly and painfully rethink their lives and futures. No one deserves to feel invisible or dismissed because of the ordinary way their injuries came about. My journey will be difficult, but I want to turn my losses into something with a purpose.

Fourteen months ago, a car door broke my brain.

Nine months ago, gym equipment broke it again.

Two months ago, the wind helped break it for a third time.

Because sometimes, it isn’t just a dramatic accident that changes everything. Sometimes, it’s a car door, gym equipment, or the wind. Sometimes, it is the strength it takes to rebuild your life after an ordinary object turns your life upside down.