My Stroke of Insight: Fascinating interview with stroke survivor/brain scientist Jill Bolte Taylor.

[Fridays Child]

http://www.here-now.org/

Brain Scientist's Stroke Leads to Enlightenment
Dr. Jill Bolte Taylor is a Harvard-trained brain scientist whose fast-paced life came to a grinding halt when at the age of 37 she suffered a massive, near fatal stroke. The left side of her brain, that's responsible for logic, ego and language went offline and she was left with a feeling of euphoria and enlightenment. She fully recovered over the course of 8 years, and she tells her story in the New York Times bestseller

A link to an audio interview follows the above paragraph. It's definitely worth listening to.

Also, there's a great video presentation here:

http://www.ted.com/index.php/talks/jill_bolte_taylor_s_powerful_stroke_of_insight.html

[liberalmuse]

1. I saw this a few months ago.

It was very compelling.

[Fridays Child]

2. Her experience with euphoria and her description of the left brain as the stress brain...

...are something to ponder. It's made me want to get her boo0k and to re-read Leonard Shlain's The Alphabet Versus the Goddess.

[Hekate]

3. The NPR radio interview is phenomenal. Hubby is getting the book from the library tomorrow...

My mother in law had a stroke a month ago. She's 95 and the MRI showed one big stroke and a bunch of smaller past ones -- she is really in the no-recovery, end-of-life realm. She's hanging on due to some utterly amazing DNA, but -- feeding tube, full care, paralysis.

Nonetheless, there were two things that jumped out at me from even hearing just part of the interview. First was the author's experience of bliss and her realization that, as she puts it, "everything is brain circuitry". She is able to reconnect with that state any time now that she has experienced it. Mr. H is a Buddhist and her experience -- as the author expressed -- is of great interest to a lot of people on a religious or spiritual path.

Second -- and this does apply to my MIL -- the author fully experienced the presence of other people's energy when they were in the room with her. She was without language, but she knew who was caring for her with full attention because they wanted to, and who was just checking her off a To Do list.

I really want to read that book.

Hekate

[Fridays Child]

4. Me, too.

It seems like an important book to read, doesn't it?

[Fovea]

5. Left posterior cerebral artery stroke surivor.

And the flip side is that I have a very difficult time with stress.

If I can stay unstressed, I am functional. Stress me, and I shut down.

I lost my left thalamus, and it deals with executive function. I have a bitch of a time with planning and the passage of time.

[Fridays Child]

7. So, maybe your ability to process stress was part of what was damaged?

Did you experience any of the "Nirvana" that she describes?

[Fovea]

11. I have overwhelming emotional responses to things

and a sense of how interconnected everything is.

Also, as reported by others with my type stroke, my
visual artistic style and sense are 100% different
than before.

I went from being a big Renaissance fan (sadly, I lost feeling in my right hand, which took playing the lute from me), to loving
the Impressionists, Expressionists, and Moderns.

On the good side, I started taking up bass again, so the numb right hand has a string big enough to feel.

I also have a visual deficit too big to safely drive with.
So know I mostly bicycle.

[Fridays Child]

12. Amazing. You really could have contributed to her book.

I think it's interesting that your art preference is now for certain works that contain fewer details but are appreciated more in their entirety. That seems so consistent with right brain function.

[TexasObserver]

14. Ditto. Major personality changes.

Don't like noise. Don't like sudden bursts of sound. Don't like crowds. Don't like being anywhere the noise level is too much, or the bustle too much. Don't organize things the way I once did. Don't make lists like I used to make. I startle, where I never did before.

The brain is subject to modification - chemically, arterially, electrically - and when it modifies, it changes you.

I used to run on stress. Now I run from it.

[susanna]

6. As a nobody,

I went through something similar at 14 years old. I contracted acute viral encephalitis, which is utterly oblivious to the brain destruction it causes. It's an infection; what does it know?

I say to this day that the human brain is nothing short of amazing. I had more than a similar experience to Dr. Taylor; the brain reconstructs itself over time, and in ways you would never expect based on your previous knowledge of your "life." I will definitely check out her book. I'm betting I could have contributed to it. :-)

on edit: bad editing

[Fridays Child]

8. I'm going to read it, too.

:hi:

[susanna]

17. We should PM once we've read it and trade thoughts. I'd enjoy that.

I am so looking forward to this one. It was so confusing to go through the experience of your brain "re-configuring" that it is hard to explain to people who have never been there. Now I know you'll understand. :-)

[Fridays Child]

19. Let's do that. I want to pick it up tomorrow.

I have a book I'm working on now so I'll probably start Jill Bolte Taylor's book in a week or so.

[susanna]

20. That's about where I am.

I have about two books on my table, but one can wait. I'll PM you next weekend, and we'll see where we're at, if that sounds good to you. :-)

[Fridays Child]

22. Yes. Perfect.

[Kaleko]

9. That video of hers,

Stroke of Insight, is a must-see, amazing experience.

Can't recommend it enough.

[Fridays Child]

10. I agree.

[TexasObserver]

13. most stroke victims experience Depression, not elation

Go for a month where you can't talk to anyone on the phone because you can't remember who you're talking to. That will get you depressed in a hurry.

[Fridays Child]

15. Yeah, I don't think her experince is typical. But she also talks about...

...some pretty frustrating aspects, too.

[TexasObserver]

16. Yes, I think it shows there are unique aspects of such events.

I had the strangest side effect of having a stroke. It was as if some newer circuitry had been burned out, but some older circuitry was revived and refreshed. My memory of some aspects of my life simply got rearranged or disappeared. The other day, I got confused about some political events in the 80s, and "remembered" an event three years earlier than it happened.

There are things in the 80s and 90s I just can't recall any more, huge chunks of information. But my memories of earlier times are better than ever, really amazing. I can remember clearly things from 40 or 50 years ago, but I can't remember whether we talked about that last week.

Depression is one of the most common side effects of stroke, and that's pretty understandable. I think this woman's experience demonstrates that sometimes a more severe event will produce some positive effects. However, it could just as easily have left her severely impaired. She was lucky, and that luck has given us some insights into how the brain works.

[susanna]

18. Interesting, TexasObserver.

You hit on my biggest problem with the re-configuring of the brain after my bout with encephalitis: your description of circuitry really analogizes the feeling well. As for time and recollection, I do not remember very much from before I got sick (14 years old). Well, maybe one or two vague and distant things, but literally, the bulk of my childhood memories were destroyed. My parents and siblings still bring up all these things we did, and I have no real recollection of them. For all intents and purposes, my conscious life began after my brain injury. It's strange to not be able to remember the formative years!

Though each person's case is unique, I find it paradoxically interesting at how similar brain injuries really are. It doesn't matter if it was an accident, an infection or a stroke, you're still going to have these "huh?" moments that others do not sense and you can't explain.

Great post.

on edit: I forgot something (how appropriate). :-)

[TexasObserver]

21. Yes, it's like the information on your hard drive you can't access any more

They say you don't really delete anything on the hard drive without reformatting it, that you merely erase the path that takes you to the information. That's how I feel at times.

Shortly after my stroke, I was thinking about KD Lang's tune, Constant Craving, for some reason. However, I could not remember her name to save my life. I knew her music, her history, her face, but I could not call her name. I purposely did not look it up. After months, I finally asked my son, and he called her name immediately. How could that information simply go away? I don't know, but it did.

That's one example. There are many. I used to have an air tight memory. Now, old friends tell funny stories from our past, stories I have to sometimes admit I have no memory of.

[susanna]

23. First, I love "Constant Craving." :-)

Second, again you hit the nail on the head: it's as if your hard drive has a new route, and goodness help you but you're only along for the ride. "You'll get there when you get there." I have just come to accept that the whole scenario has taught me patience with those things I don't get right away. :-)