On december sixth, 2015, I sustained a traumatic brain injury due to a fall off of a horse. The horse spooked and ran in one direction, sending me in the other. One of my teammates and captain, whilst the audience was silent, came up to me asking, "Laura, are you okay? I heard a loud bang. Did you hit the wall?" Initially, I was fine. I was seen by the EMT seemingly just fine, and was cleared to return to competition. It was not until two days later that I began to notice a headache. Had I reported any sumptoms of a concussion I was experiencing such as headache, dizziness, nausea, and trouble walking, it would have warranted an immediate stop, drop, and roll straight to the local neurologist.

After the accident, I did not say anything aobut the symptoms I was experiencing, including trouble walking, headaches, dizziness, and nausea. I pushed it through my final exams, completely failing them. I also was at home for a couple of months prior to my late hospitalization, and hardly slept due to jitting myhead just so. I didn't tell my parents about any of the symptoms I was experiencing, or I would have been in the hospital much sooner. At home, I also became very confused, almost dazed. I was thinking unclearly and just about anything that was otherwise normal around the house was completely confusing me.

Additionally, I suffered many sleepless nights doe to the blunt force and precise location of my brain injury. It was not until I was hospitalized that I got my sleep under control, my brain really started to heal, and I began to come around as my normal self again.

I was in and out of the hospital, and during my late hospitalization, i was in the hospital for over a month for emotional stuff and also to get my headaches and sleep under control. I was in a psych ward with a bunch of other teenagers. There were some activities, such as videogames or watching a movie. Watching a movie was in the evenings and I could not partake in that due to my brain injury. Instead, I spent a couple of hours in my hospital room usually journaling most nights, or choosing ot go straight to bed. Also, whille I was in the hospital, despite the medical team's knowledge of me having a brain injury, they still decided to push me to attend school, without necessarily knwooing the severity of my brain injury and how well I could tolerate focusing to read without getting a headache. This became very frusturating for me. Alternatively, however, I could color, however that would eventually trigger a headache, so I resorted to putting my head down for about five or ten minutes. Each day, I was only able to read about a page during the hour time period we were in school during the entire day. I was in the hospital for six weeks.

This brain injury has me out of school for at least a year and a half. While I was in the hospital, I decided I would channel my creativityand thoughtfulness into starting my own business and setting up an etsy store. I am also spending many hours a day painting, mainly painting butterflies. Not only does it give me something to do, it is a creative outlet for me as I am uncertain about my future, thanks to the anxiety that comes with a significant brain injury.

During my recovery, I will also be doing some therapeutic riding, considering that the level of riding I was at prior to falling onto my head would not be appropriate. I will get to see how I feel about riding again, whether I choose to compete or not. I also plan on overcoming my brain injury and eventually returning to my previous level of riding, and possibly some competing, however only with my own horse.

Ultimately, I will come out of this chapter of my journey a much stronger, more competent individual, having gone through an event most people do not go through, especially at my age, in high school, and choose to handle it gently and seize the opportunity to do something great rather than sit around doing nothing, despite having every right to do absolutely nothing.