When I got hit in the head, I knew nothing about concussions. In fact, I wasn’t even worried that I might have a concussion because I believed that you had to get knocked unconscious to have one.
Turns out, I was wrong. Only about 10% of concussions involve being knocked unconscious.
This blog is not meant as medical advice, it’s just my experience and what I’ve learned about concussions over the last two weeks. (If you have a concussion, I’d be willing to bet a doctor spent more than two weeks learning about concussions and you should probably talk to them about it, just in case.)
So I got hit in the dome.
I was teaching yoga. My v dangerous job, apparently. And I was teaching wheel walkovers. If you know what that is, you might be thinking that sounds more like gymnastics than yoga, but I teach it using a wall which is not very physically challenging (at least not much more so than doing wheel pose). It’s more about confronting your fear and facing your relationship to control.
Because it is quite scary, there is a very specific way to spot this. You have to stand or kneel to the student’s side in a place where you won’t get kicked in the dome, while still spotting the low back and shoulder (sometimes when people get scared, they collapse - so you have to protect them from hitting their heads).
I was with a student who had diastasis recti, which is separation of the rectus abdominis (six pack), usually caused by pregnancy. She didn’t think she could do it because of the injury but was interested in trying. I watched her do wheel just a moment before, so I knew that she could. The hardest part would just be keeping her core engaged in wheel. The rest of it would actually bring her abdominal muscles closer together which is good for her injury.
Long story short, we had a miscommunication.
I offered to work with her in wheel, and in that first step of placing her foot on the wall. We could see how that felt, and then maybe decide to try the whole thing. Because I had planned to watch her core to make sure she was engaging everything nicely for her injury, I didn’t step into the correct place to spot.
Naturally, putting her foot on the wall felt just fine - which was exciting - so she kicked right over. If I were in her place, I would have done the EXACT same thing. Wheel walkovers are super fun. And the first time I did one, I was stoked. It was so easy. It was all momentum. Just one hard kick and you’re over!
But that one hard kick landed right in my temple.
It was so surprising and so painful I had to fight back tears. I tried to laugh it off but it really hurt. I had to step out and splash my face with cold water before I could finish teaching the class.
My student felt awful - even though it was not her fault at all. She heard my teeth knock together. Honestly it probably hurt her knee too.
As soon as I got into my car, I cried on the drive home. And I am not a crier.
When I got home and walked into the house, I cried again.
I had a headache and intense pressure in my head like I’d never experienced before.
Usually I’m an essential oils girl. If I have a headache, I drink water and put on essential oils and that typically takes the edge off enough that I can manage.
It wasn’t enough. It was unbearable. So I took some Tylenol.
That may seem like no big deal, but I only take pharmaceuticals if I am desperate.
I felt exhausted. I slept about 12 hours that night. Woke up with a splitting headache again. Took more Tylenol to get through my two morning classes.
I felt like I was either on the verge of tears or actually crying all morning. I checked to see if my period was coming up because I had no idea where this was coming from. In my mind, it had to be hormones. But my period was nowhere near.
Later that day at lunch with my fiance, he suggested I may have a concussion. At this point, I still believed that you had to have been knocked unconscious to have a concussion. I was honestly afraid to even look it up.
What would that mean if I had one? Did I have to go to the ER? How long would this take to heal? How much was this going to cost?
Other than nausea and amnesia, I had nearly every symptom that I found online.
Headache or a feeling of pressure in the head
Confusion or feeling as if in a fog
Ringing in the ears
Slurred speech
Delayed response to questions
Appearing dazed
Fatigue
Concentration and memory complaints
Irritability and other personality changes (hello, crying all the time)
Sensitivity to light and noise (I actually cried when someone yelled, not at me, just in general)
Sleep disturbances
image via Concussion Legacy Foundation
Most of what I read said to rest. I asked a few friends who played sports and who’d had concussions (my fiance had also had one), and everyone around me said to rest and go to a doctor if the symptoms didn’t start getting better soon.
So I did.
I spent an entire day in bed. I took a whole weekend off - barely left the house.
I looked up all of the best foods to eat when healing from a concussion, all of the best essential oils to use when healing from a concussion, what to avoid, what signs to look for. I basically became my own healer.
So here is what I learned:
First, go to the doctor. Just go. Your brain is not something to mess with. I didn’t go because I knew how mild mine was and because if something bad was going to happen, it probably already would have happened by the time I realized I had a concussion.
Second, it is not a good idea to take ibuprofen or other anti-inflammatory drugs. These can mess with the blood clotting process in the event of a brain bleed. A brain bleed is very scary. A brain bleed that can’t clot itself is even scarier.
Third, one of the ways to look for a brain bleed is by checking out your pupils. Go to a doctor immediately (and do not drive yourself) if one pupil is larger than the other, if they are unresponsive to light, or if you experience changes in vision. There are lots of other symptoms of a brain bleed, this is just one way to look for it.
Fourth, rest means rest. Even your brain. This was really hard for me. It didn’t just mean stop doing physical activity, it also meant limiting mental activity including screen time. When I thought I was fine, I’d check a few emails and instantly my headache worsened. Going back to teaching was a challenge as well. Inversions - even mild ones like Downdog - increased the pressure I felt in my head and gave me more of a headache. I opted out of those completely for a full week, and limited my time in them afterwards. Most concussions heal within 7-10 days. Going back to pre-concussion activity too soon can delay healing and even regress healing. Rest. Rest. And I can’t stress this enough - rest.
Fifth, food heals. These are some of the foods I made it a point to eat while healing:
Blueberries
Green tea
Kale, especially red kale
Cranberries
Pecans, and other nuts
Olive oil
Broccoli
Dark chocolate
And finally, essential oils can help alleviate the symptoms of a concussion. Personally, I used lavender, frankincense, and turmeric oils to help but all of these are said to be helpful.
Lavender
Frankincense
Turmeric
Helichrysum
Clove
Concussions are no joke. The mood swings, headaches, pressure, exhaustion, crazy dreams, that feeling of being in a fog and any of the other symptoms you might experience are enough to make you feel crazy and worry that you’ll never be the same. But they do eventually go away. Rest. Listen to your body. Feed your brain. And rest some more.