Episode 7 - Medical Miracles

1.5 million Americans suffer from traumatic brain injury every year. Many of them don't make a full recovery or survive at all. Luckily, that is not Brianna's story. July 1, 2020 Victoria Kozlowski received a call that her daughter Brianna had fallen and "it was bad." Today Vanessa talks with both Brianna and her mother about what happened that day, the long days that followed, and the encounters with God Brianna has experienced since then.

Ok, But Seriously airs Tuesday evenings 6-7 pm on 91.5 KUNV The Rebel HD-2.

What is Ok, But Seriously?

Ok, But Seriously airs Tuesday evenings from 6-7pm and gives you the information you need in the way you want. Vanessa Lauren, UNLV broadcast major and Vegas native, talks about her passion for people, history and storytelling. Join her as she breaks down all of the serious topics in a non-serious way. If you are looking to learn and laugh this is the show for you… seriously.

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Hello everyone. Good evening. Welcome back to Okay But Seriously. I am your host, Vanessa Lauren. You are listening to 91.5, the Rebel HD2. Tonight, I am excited because we are talking medical miracles, y'all. This has been something that's been put on my heart. If you're new to the show, I take serious topics and break them down in a non-serious way. And I like to do that by interviewing people. So I found this next guest and her daughter through tick tock. So I'm very excited to bring you their story. I'm going to let them tell it. So buckle up, get a water, you're not going to want to miss a minute of this. So do all you got to do and then just tune in. Really open your mind to hear Victoria and Brianna story tonight. I hope it touches you the way it touched me. So without further ado, here's Victoria and Brianna. Brianna and Victoria, thank you so much for both of you being here and telling us your story. I just really would love to hear it. I want our listeners to hear it straight from you. So for those who don't have any idea, like who is this Victoria and Brianna person,

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why don't you go ahead and whoever is more comfortable sharing why you're here today is because my daughter, Brianna, she's a traumatic brain injury survivor. She suffered a major traumatic brain injury July 1st of 2020. And I can go in and tell you the little, start from the beginning because you get a better grasp on what actually happened and where she's at today. So July 1st of 2020, I was at my office and I'm working and I'm always doing TikTok. So I'm in my office and I'm doing a TikTok and I'm picking up the phone, pretending I'm

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on the phone.

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Having a good old time, when I was supposed to be working, but my husband and I own a Medicare office, so we're good on that end. I hang up the phone and I finished my TikTok and I said, okay, I'll go home and I'll go and I'll edit it. Well, at that point, it was already three o'clock and I was supposed to pick up my other daughter. She was at the park with her friends. And, you know, I told my husband I'm leaving, I got to go. And I left and I came home, I pulled into the driveway and I looked at the time, I'm like, oh, shoot, I'm like, I gotta go now. So I turned the car back around. I start heading to pick up my daughter and my phone rings and I see that it's my daughter, Brianna. And I pick up the phone and I'm like, hey girl, what's going on?

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You know, that's how we are.

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We're just talking. And it's her friend and she goes, Mama K. She goes, Brianna fell off the golf cart and her ear is bleeding. I go, oh, geez. I'm like, is she okay? She's like, I don't know. She's bleeding. I'm like, okay. Um, let me just head over to where you guys are at. You know, I asked her where she was and they were in the subdivision where she lives, um, which is a golf, um, a golf community. So they have a golf course attached to their community and they drive golf carts through the neighborhood and stuff.

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So, living their best lives, huh?

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Yeah.

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So, I headed that way and as I'm turning the car around, she calls me back. And I'm like, hello? She goes, are you almost here? Hurry, she's bleeding a lot. That's when my heart dropped. My heart, I'm like, oh my God, she's bleeding a lot. She goes, should I call 911? I'm like, yes, call 911 now. I go, they'll get there before me. So I turn the car on, I'm doing 100 miles an hour, and it still took me 10 minutes. It felt like the longest 10 minutes of my life. I finally end up getting there, and when I pull into the subdivision, they had blocked off the subdivision. There was a fire truck, an ambulance, two police cars, and neighbors all over.

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Wow.

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My body was just like, I was in like go mode and hyperventilating. I'm like, oh my God, I'm going to get out of the car. I'm wearing these heels and a pencil skirt and I'm like running to where my daughter's at. And I see her laying in the middle of the road in a pile of blood that was literally surrounding her whole entire head.

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Wow.

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When I saw her, my knees collapsed and I just like dropped down to her and I'm like, Brianna, Brianna, and the paramedic came up to us and they said, why isn't she responding as her eyes were rolled in the back of her head? And I'm like, Brianna, Brianna, and she was non-responsive and all of a sudden she started like shaking she was having a seizure, but I Wasn't aware of that. I'm like, why is she shaking? Why is she shaking the paramedic looks at the other paramedic and he says Ma'am, he's like she's gonna be okay But she's starting to see so we need to give her an injection and get her to the hospital immediately Well, all this is going on. There's a helicopter trying to land because apparently they wanted to fly her out to trauma but they couldn't land because we were in a subdivision. So the paramedic says to me, he's like, you need to get in your car and you need to meet us at the hospital. So I grabbed her phone which was on her stomach, her friend had put her phone on her stomach, so I grabbed the phone and out of all the times, she always has her phone locked. You know, teenagers, her phone is always locked. I pick up the phone and I said, call dad and the call just went through. I don't even know how the call went through because my voice wasn't activated in her phone. It just went through. So I call my husband, I'm like hyperventilating, I'm like repeating my words one after the other like repeating one word three or four times and my husband's like Brianna because I was calling him from her phone. He's like Brianna. Stop it. Stop joking around. I'm like, this is it Brianna It's me. It's me. Um, I'm like you need to meet me at the hospital because Brianna had an accident Um, he was literally two minutes from the hospital So he's like, okay, I'll meet you there. During the whole scene, apparently there was one of the neighbors who was a paramedic who had tried to help the girls while the fire truck and the ambulance got there. She got towels and stuff, but they kept her in the same position. They didn't move her. They put her in the gurney. They take her. I drive to the hospital and when I get to the hospital, my husband's waiting there for me and they put us in this little room and the doctor comes in and he says, ma'am, he goes, your daughter's injury is severe and we need to fly her out to trauma. My stomach dropped because you're thinking, you never realize how bad a head injury is because you know, you figure you hit your head you've got a skull you know it's gonna protect you but never in my mind did I think it was as bad as I was going to be told how it was. Sure. So my husband loses it and he's like a mess and I said to the doctor I said well I go before you fly my daughter out I need to see her. So he takes us into the little room where she was still in the gurney from the scene. And her eyes are still rolled in the back of her head. She's just laying there. She's strapped down. And I leaned down into her ear and I said, Briana, God, honey, I don't know if you can hear me. I go, but this is your time to call out for him. I go, you need to call for God, say a prayer, even if it's just an hour, Father, just say the prayer, call him. I go and ask him to help you. I go because from this point on, I go, he's the only one that's going to be able to help save you. And right after I said that, her shoulders started shrugging like this. She heard me. Yeah, but she was unconscious. So I don't know, almost like she wanted to hug me or something. And my eyes were just like starting to tear, but I was hyperventilating. Mind you, I did not shed a tear this whole time. It was like my body couldn't, I felt like I was dry inside and all I could do was breathe to keep myself composed. Doctor said, okay, we're flying her out to Lutheran General which is a trauma center closest to us, and my husband and I get in our cars and we go home. We change because we knew this was going to be a long, a long day. We change and we head out to the hospital. And when we get to the other hospital, we're sitting there with my, it was my husband and my in-laws, and the surgeon comes in and he paused, he goes, I really don't know how to put this to you. He goes, but if I can't explain this to you in layman's terms, if I were to put your daughter on a scale from three to 11, 11 being perfect, like you and me, healthy, and three being gone, I think your daughter's at a four. Wow. That's when my husband really lost it. And yet I'm still composed and I'm like, so what do we do? Right. What do we do? What he goes, well, he goes, um, the only thing we can do right now, he's like, is we can, we can do a cranioplasty, a craniolectomy, which means we have to cut out the whole right side of her skull and let the brain swell until it comes, until the brain swelling goes down and then eventually you put it back on. Little did I know how long this process was going to be. I said, you know what, you do what you have to do to save my daughter. I go, I don't care. He goes, well, we have the papers, we have your daughter in the operating room now. So we're just waiting for you to sign and sign it off. He's like, I really, to be honest with you, I don't know and I have no idea why I'm at this hospital today. He goes, normally, he goes, I am never at this hospital, but I just happened to be on call. He goes, the other strange thing is, is that any other doctor wouldn't do the surgery because her injury is so severe. They wouldn't want to put all these medical expenses on you, knowing that this isn't going to work. He's like, but the fact that she's young, is that 1% chance I'm giving her because I want to give it to her if you allow me to. So basically he was saying he doesn't think she's going to make it. And he didn't want to put all those expenses on us, but he wanted to give her that chance. Yeah. And I said, I go, you do what you have to do. Money is not an issue at this point. Right. So there he goes. He went and he did the surgery six hours later. He came in and he told us that she didn't have any brain activity until months after she started recuperating. He confessed to me, he goes when she showed up to the ER she had zero brain activity, which means they basically just kind of, if it was somebody like you and I they would have just said forget it. You just put her on life support and see how well she does and just go from there. But the fact that she pulled through is like a miracle because even during, even after the surgery, that surgery took six hours, even after the surgery, like a day or two later, she still had zero brain activity, but they still kept her and they were like taking care of her like they wanted her to pull through and her brain pressures were so tremendously high. Their goal was to bring down the pressures to see if she would come back. You know, believe it or not, she was still trying to pull out of that coma. Okay. And even after the regular induced coma, they had to put her on the highest induced coma because she was trying to come out of it, but her brain pressures were so high they couldn't because she could have, it could have been worse. Do you know what happens if someone comes out of an induced coma with like a swelled brain like that? I mean, does it ever extend? Yeah, they can have seizures. I mean, because your brain is, what happens is when your brain is swollen and your brain needs blood to flow through it. If your brain is really swollen and it's pushing up against the walls of the skull, what happens is that it basically suffocates the brain and kills it. Got it. So, yeah, so it's really important to keep the

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pressures low at all times. Which is terrifying to think about, right? Right, because they wanted the pressures to be at 10 and hers were at 30. Oh gosh. Yeah, so when she was in a coma. After she had to learn everything from scratch when she came out of the coma. Well, let me go back a little bit because this is kind of more like a miraculous thing. So during, it was during COVID. So my husband and I were not allowed to stay. Couldn't spend the night and we had to take turns visiting her. So if I was in there with her, I had to leave and then he had to come in and they wouldn't even let

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us sit in the waiting room. We had to sit in our car.

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Oh my goodness. Yes. So my husband sat in the car for like six hours a day while I sat up there with

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her. But he wouldn't leave, of course. Yeah. Did you want to say something? Yes, and my dad, when I was at the hospital, he'd stay, like he'd just sit by my hospital bed and he'd hold my hand. I'd ask him to hold my hand until I fell asleep.

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Oh.

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Yeah, this was later, after she was in rehab. So this was still at the trauma center. Mm-hmm. She was at two hospitals.

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Okay. After being taken out of surgery and days later, we kept

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trying to call a priest to come in anointed because at this point, we didn't know if she was going to make it. Yeah, she's still in a coma, we had no idea if she was ever even going to come out of the coma. So we called the priest, but they wouldn't let the priest in from the hospital. So the hospital priest came in and he anointed her, but we still wanted our priest to come

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in.

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Days later, finally, there was like some sort of window where they were able to let the priest in. The priest came in and he started praying over her. And he took the oils and anointed her and her eyes fluttered. Her eyes were closed and they literally fluttered and I looked at him and I'm like, oh my God, her eyes just fluttered. And he just had this graceful smile and he's like, yes, that's what they do. It was almost like a very peaceful, like he knew that this was going to happen. It was just kind of very amazing. So that was the first time she fluttered Then a week later, she started opening her eyes, a little by little. And then that's when we knew that she was okay. The scariest part of this whole process was, I mean, of course, the injury. Sure. The different stages that you see your daughter going through as she recovers. She went, literally, she went from being in a coma to being in a vegetative state. And that was like days and days. And you see her and she like can barely move her arm and she's like,

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right.

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And that to me was the hardest part because I prayed so hard and I asked God, I'm like, please give her back to me. Don't take her away from me. Just give her to me. However you feel you want to give her back to me, but don't take her.

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Wow.

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And when I saw her in that vegetative state, I said to myself, I go, thank you, God. Right. Is this it? Is this what, is this what I'm gonna end up with?

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Sure.

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And I accepted it.

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I'm like, you know what?

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I go, I asked him to give her back to me and he did. And it's how she is. So, and from there, it's just like progressively though. So she went from a vegetative state to almost like a deep Autistic state to a medium to a light and it just kept progressing progressing We had flashcards yes and no flashcards because she couldn't talk She had a tracheotomy and a feeding tube So we had flashcards yes and no flashcards. Do you want water? Yes or no? And she was literally with her eyes, she would answer the question.

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Oh, wow.

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So she went from there to learning to walk again, because she her muscles deteriorated. So she had no, she also had a shattered and dislocated ankle. Oh, gosh. So she was she almost lost her foot. Oh, goodness. Out of the golf cart. Apparently, she rolled on her on her foot, shattered and dislocated and then bounced back and hit her head. Okay. So apparently that's how the injury happened. She was doing an Instagram live on the golf cart. Okay. I skipped that part but yes she was with her friend in the neighborhood driving the golf cart and she was you know filming, laughing, they were singing, and she got up to pull her shorts, but when she stepped down, she stepped out. Or instead of stepping in, she stepped out and flew right. I mean, we even have a video clip of it. It's like instant, you know, she stands up and boom, all of a sudden she's like out. Yes, and keep in mind that she was driving the golf cart 30 miles

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an hour. Kind of the fastest a golf cart can go. Yeah, so you were in full motion until you were like their hair was glowing. Yeah, right my gosh

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So that's learning everything, you know, they said, okay, she's ready. She can go to rehab so we took her to Mary and Joy Rehabilitation Center here in Illinois and they took care of her there and they

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Got her muscles back up and moving once they felt that she was, didn't mean she had speech, very occupational. Yes.

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The, my rehabilitation center, that is the only thing that I have a little bit of

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memory of. My whole hospital time, no memory at all. Welcome back everyone. If you're just joining us, welcome. I am Vanessa Lauren. You're listening to OK, but Seriously on 91.5, the Rebel HD 2. I don't know how you found us, but I'm glad you did. If you're listening on the podcast, thank you for being supportive of us in that way. We are listener supported, so we appreciate all of our listeners, whether you listen live or whether you listen on the podcast, always a good thing. Tonight we are talking about medical miracles. It's been a wild ride listening to Victoria, who is the mother of Brianna, share her experience first of 2020 when she got that dreaded parent phone call that her baby, her loved one had been injured. So she just walked us through her account. If you missed that part, again, you can always catch us on the podcast. So don't worry, you can always catch it later on when it wherever you listen to your podcast. But if you've been with us since the beginning, I don't want to waste any more time, we're going to get right back into it. Brianna is now going to walk us through what she has experienced since that day. So without further ado, here's Brianna. But Brianna, I guess out of everything your mother's saying, I'm sure you've heard her tell it to you. So now maybe it kind of feels like when our parents tell us like, oh, when you were a baby you used to do this. And you're like, oh, yeah, I remember that.

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But what do you like actually recall from the event? So I remember riding on the golf cart with my friend. I remember doing Instagram Live and having fun. We were dancing to music on her speaker. And I remember standing up to my short stem. I don't remember anything after that. I don't remember. And the last thing I remember is the Rehabilitation Center. I only remember a couple nurses there. Okay, so then how much time Victoria was it from the accident to the rehabilitation center? Let's see, she went in July 1st and they dismissed her July August September 7th I believe. So she was in the one hospital for two months and then got taken to the rehabilitation center.

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Okay.

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She was there for another month.

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So it was a total of three months hospitalization before she actually got to come home. Okay. Now, Breanna, I've never been in anything like this. I've never known anyone like this who's gone into any sort of coma or anything like that. Do you, was it like you were just sleeping or like in a dream or was there anything there like that? I did not even know that I was

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in a coma. I didn't feel that I was sleeping until I got to my rehabilitation center and my parents were telling me that I got into an accident and I was in shock. I was like oh my goodness.

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I actually lost 50% of my long-term and short-term memory. Oh my gosh. Yeah there's a lot of stuff that she doesn't remember from the past.

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Like, we went to Dominican just a couple weeks ago. No, we didn't. Yeah, we went to Mexico and she doesn't remember that trip, but we went to Dominican and we stayed at the same hotel we stayed at before. And she, like, remembers, like, clips, but she doesn't remember a lot of the things.

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Okay.

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And I remember certain, like, spots. I was like, I remember this pool or something. And my dad goes, oh, do you remember dancing with the workers over here? And I was like, no I did a lot of dancing on this recent trip that we did

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Okay, and like is that was that how how you were like before your accident? Did you happen to like that like I know for myself. I tell people I have an elephant memory I can remember everything but were you kind of a person who? Ever had issues of memory anything No

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No, because I was a competitive dancer, so I learned to dance and the next day I'd have

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to compete in that dance.

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Oh yeah.

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But no, my psychiatrist actually told me that my brain injury affected my personality 110%. Really? So I'm a good person now. Everybody's telling me that I'm more talkative and outgoing, and my parents, when I came home from the rehabilitation center, they came up to me and they go, oh, Brianna, you're so different. And I got like sad. I said, oh, why is that? And they said, you're so much more sweet, kind, loving, and affectionate. I said, oh my God, that's amazing.

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I think I changed for the better. Victoria, I know you can't say, like, as a mom, I'm sure, I'm not a mom, but I know a lot of moms I have three sisters that are moms you never want to be like oh my child is was this way now they're they're better quote-unquote but is it is what she's saying obviously true that like it does it feel like she's a different person to you? Oh for sure like I can't even explain to you like I feel like she was given a whole new soul. Wow. So different than she was before her mentality the way she thinks her thought process everything is different The the things she liked before she doesn't like now and she likes different things now as a matter of fact We joke around because I We just around I go you're such a Karen Younger than you are

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You are now.

0:25:09
Yeah, I'll be talking to my sister and she'll be doing some stuff and I'll tell her, Ariana, that's not, you shouldn't be doing that. That's not appropriate or that's not safe or something. She goes, oh, you sound like a grandma. I'm like, okay, I'm just trying to protect you.

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Wow.

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That's so interesting.

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Like, so in, in rehabilitation, were you, do you, I know it was COVID so it might be different but were you able to I guess maybe like meet anybody else or make any other kind of friends in there that have been anything similar? Um actually the rehab center that we went to most of the kids there was another girl who was there who also had a brain injury but no because they really kept you they keep you secluded from each patient, you know, like they want the cases to be separated. Yeah. Yeah, I was just curious. You, you did it a tick tock. It says how I found y'all was through tick tock. But you made a tick tock saying how Brianna you had some sort of encounter with God. Do you remember that?

0:26:23
Yes. When I came, so my whole life, I've been praying every single night. When I came home permanently, I started praying every night, thanking God for giving me a second chance at life since he brought me back to life. And I heard somebody say, you're very welcome, Brianna. I said, hello? And he said, hello? I said, Dad, is that you? And he goes, no, it's me. And I said, Dad, I know it's you, come out. He goes, no, Brianna, it's me, it's God. And I just went into shock, my eyes started tearing up. I said, I can hear you? He said, yes, you can. He said, because since you passed away, I got to recreate you of age, because he creates baby infants. You have to recreate me of age, because I was 17 at the time. And he told me that he gave me the blessing of being able to hear him. And so now every night I have conversations with him. He gives me advice.

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He tells me things. It's just such a blessing. I love it.

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What a gift. That's amazing. That's like the, and I know it might be difficult for some people to hear that and like comprehend that, you know, but that's your reality. That's your day to day life. And that's, that's your truth. You know, that's what you're living, right? So a lot of people cannot hear him.

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So he just gives them signs, hoping that they will see them.

0:27:45
Oh, that's amazing. I'm so fascinated. I'm a, I'm a Christian by faith. So I'm over here like, well, what else does he say? Like I'm just so curious.

0:27:54
Yes.

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My mom actually talks to God through me.

0:27:57
Oh, wow.

0:27:58
Like asking him questions like, Hey, can you know what, you know, I know a lot of people listening right now are probably thinking, oh, it's probably part of her brain injury. And she's really hallucinating. And because I thought the same thing I thought to myself, I'm like, I said, Yes, I go. It's got to be part of her brain injury, probably the healing process or something. But there have been so many things that have confirmed the fact that it's not. So when she was praying one day, she said to me, she goes, Mom, she goes, your grandma wants to say hi. I go, what? I go, oh, okay. I go, tell her I said hi and tell her I miss her. And then she's like, she says she misses you too, Vickita. Vickita was what she called me when I was younger.

0:28:51
Sorry, I didn't understand.

0:28:53
So, how's my Google?

0:28:55
Yeah.

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So at that point, I looked at her and I go, what did you say?

0:29:01
She said,

0:29:02
She said, Hola Vickita, te quiero mucho. Hello Victoria, I miss you so much.

0:29:07
I love you so much.

0:29:08
And I love you so much.

0:29:09
Yeah, so at that point, I was like, how did she know? She doesn't know. She never once I've never talked to anybody or mentioned anybody what my grandma used to call me because she passed away years ago. She passed away I think when she was like five. So you wouldn't even know what my grandma called me back then. Sure. Yeah. Very, very interesting. And there's also been other scenarios that have confirmed that she actually does talk to him. I think one of them. I don't know this one may have been the tick-tock that you saw Was like she said that she had seen him I asked her I go. What does he look like? And she's like well, you know he's this face is like he's got a jawline He's got short hair mom. He doesn't have long hair like everybody thinks so he's got short hair, and it's wavy I'm like really so what do I do? I go on the internet and I start pulling up a bunch of images of what we see God to be like or to write like and I said to her I go which one of these does he look like and She picked the image and I'm sure you guys have heard of this little girl who had passed and she came back to life And she painted an image of him.

0:30:26
Yes, the little, it was like, she was like four years old or something like that, I think, right?

0:30:31
Yeah. Yeah. I pulled that image up and I mixed it in with all of them because I wanted to see. And she goes, Oh, he looks just like, as a matter of fact, that's him. That's him right there. That's him. And she put up an image that a little girl painted. So from that, and then I told her the story, she goes, really? She didn't even know the story yeah no that story is wild in itself because those parents were non-religious at all did you all have like a religious background before the accident I was born and raised Catholic and I raised my kids Catholic as well and every night when I pray when I close my eyes and I pray I can see heaven and I asked God how can I see heaven and he said, because when you passed away, you went straight up to heaven because you're such a good soul on earth. So you have visual memory in the back of your head of heaven. And he also told me that when I went up to heaven, I was very popular in heaven. And I said, Oh, how so? How's that popular? And he said, Well, Brianna, when you were in heaven, you were an angel saint. And I said, oh my goodness, and he said now that I put you back on earth. You're a true saint on earth and You may not be a very popular saint, but you are a true saint And he said I can give people blessings that I care about So I gave my whole entire family a blessing and he blessed them and I love my grandparents on my mother's side They live in Costa Rica. They're struggling with money. I give him a blessing of wealth and they're doing better with money now.

0:32:02
Wow, that's amazing. See, it's so, like, even just the way you talk, like, I wish listeners, like, you can probably hear it in her voice, but you, like, visually, because we're doing this over video chat so I can see your face, and you're just, like, you brighten up, like, when you're talking.

0:32:17
It's very, like, warm and welcoming, like, you know. I've never had that before.

0:32:21
Yeah. Okay.

0:32:23
It was very, her personality before was so different. She was an introvert. She was either a typical teenager, you know how they're off on their own, they don't want to talk to anybody, no eye contact, none of that stuff. Total opposite now. She really likes talking and she loves telling people her story. I mean, she just loves to talk. You can hear it in her voice.

0:32:47
Yeah.

0:32:48
Yeah. Sharing the miracle. And when I got home from the hospital, all my muscles deteriorated in the hospital because I was immobile for so long. So I started jogging around my block every morning and I saw my neighbor Janet, she was outside in her driveway. And I was like, Mom, can we stop and say hi? And she was like, Oh, yeah. So I stopped, I gave her a big hug. I said, Hi, Janet. She's like, Oh my gosh, hi. And I had a whole conversation with her and she said, oh my goodness, the old Brianna would have never even made eye contact with me. And I said, I'd love to talk to you, Janet. I said, come over anytime and hang out with us.

0:33:24
Wow, wow.

0:33:26
Like what a wonderful thing for you to witness, Victoria. Like you talk about it now, I'm sure, because we're living in the present and it's been a year. Like when you're talking about this story, you know, it's not that it wasn't traumatic, but you seem positive about it. But living through this whole thing as the mom, as the loved one watching someone struggle and not knowing, right, at certain times if she was going to make it through, but hoping through faith that she would, I guess if there's anyone out there listening who maybe they are either going through it currently or they have gone through in the past watching a loved one live through something this traumatic, what would your advice or encouragement be to them? Because I'm sure maybe you struggled at times, if not multiple times, right?

0:34:10
Absolutely. All throughout the whole time, you know, I struggled. But if I were to give anybody advice, it's just to never give up because you just never ever know. went from brain dead to 95% recovery. Being there for that person, I feel like another thing that really helped too was that I was with her 24-7 from the day of the accident till now. So I was there watching everything every doctor came in and said and did. I had a notebook, I wrote everything down. When doctors came in and they did their powwow, I was in the powwow with them because I wanted to know what was going next. What were they doing next? I had fabulous nurses who would write down instructions for. I had one nurse that came in and he goes, listen, he goes, we're not always in the room. He goes, but he goes, that's, this is what this machine is, and he wrote it down. This machine does this, this, this, and that. You need to make sure that these numbers stay at this. And if those numbers go down, then you need to ask these questions. I mean, he literally wrote me a little booklet on things I should keep. So when I was in the room,

0:35:31
I almost felt like I was a nurse because I was keeping track of everything. If I saw anything drop, I was calling the nurse in. And I feel like it's, there could be slips. And there almost were a couple slips if I wasn't in there, like, would she have slipped and gone? Sure. So it is very important that when you, your loved one, you know, if they're going through this, that someone is there with them all the time, because they're busy, they have other patients to take care of, you know, and even after she got a little better I learned how to change her sheets. So if so, I wouldn't have to call the nurse every five minutes Hey, you need to change your knees changer. I learned to change her and it learns to change her sheets. I learned to suction out Whatever was getting caught in her tracheotomy so the nurses wouldn't have to come in when she's gurgling and she can't breathe right, um, so being part of the hospital stay and helping the nurses out I think is key because you know they're just as busy and they have other patients to take care of as well. Yeah that makes sense. Yeah. So either of you or both of you would you I mean it sounds like you've had a lot of really great like surrounding medical support. You were able to get her the help she needed to make a full recovery. Would you qualify what happened to Brianna as a miracle?

0:36:56
Absolutely, without even a doubt. I know I get a lot of back and forth on TikTok because I post and we get a lot of people say, praise God, praise God. And then you get the other side that they're like, no, praise the doctors and nurses who saved your life. But in all reality, if you put it all in the perspective, God is also part of this just as much as doctors and nurses. I'm very grateful and thankful for what they did. But if it wasn't for God putting all the I mean, he could have just said, okay, whatever, and get whatever doctor you want, but he got, I mean, why was that doctor on staff when he wasn't even on call that day? And all of a sudden they said, you know what, why don't you go on call? That's because it happened through him. I mean, that's my belief. Right. You know?

0:37:56
Yeah.

0:37:57
Why did I get all these perfect nurses? I mean, I had so many amazing nurses. I couldn't even tell you that I had one bad one.

0:38:08
That's, yeah, that's, go ahead, Brianna. I just want to make it clear that everybody should never stop believing because some long-term effects, I lost 50% of my hearing in my left ear, I lost 50% vision in my left eye, and I lost my sense of smell. And the doctors told me I'm never going to get that back. But they also told me I wasn't going to survive. And look at me here. I survived.

0:38:35
Right, yes, all true. So I was going to ask about that too. So you are, you said you're back to, you're at like 95%, right? Is that 95%?

0:38:47
I went to not walking to going to the gym every day now. I know she's 95% because I mean she still has little things like she can't drive. Yes. Because her perception of distance is not there and I don't know if that has anything to do with the fact that she can't see very well out of one eye and then she can't hear out of her left ear. Okay. Because she lost hearing because she cracked the inside of her skull where it holds a cochlea, which is a liquid that holds for the hearing. And all that liquid seeped out and there's no way of regaining that liquid.

0:39:26
And my brain injury shaved off my pituitary gland. So all my hormones got messed up. So I did not get my period for a year. I got it back now, but.

0:39:36
I mean, that sounds like a blessing if you ask me. But yeah, no, I understand that. So there's these long-term, like, things you're still dealing with, right? And I, just to kind of play devil's advocate here, again, I'm a believer myself, but there might be people who say, like, well, if you're talking with God and, you know, it was a miracle, then why don't you just ask him to, like, heal all of those things right? Have you have you

0:40:03
had anything like that? Have anybody said things like that to you? She does. She she prays. She prays upon get my sense of hearing back, get my sense of smell, get her vision. Her vision has been getting better. Yes. Absolutely. Her vision has been getting better. So we went to the eye doctor the other day and he said that that, yeah, that her, that her pupil is starting to heal more than before. She is gaining a little bit of sense of smell, which technically they said she would never gain that back because what happens is, so your sense of smell is like, like, if you see like, let's say like a strainer, and you put putty through it, and you know how it seeps through the strainer? So that's kind of what our sense of smell sensors are. When her brain shifted forward and it hit the front of her head, it shaved off those sensories. And that just says they don't grow back. But the other day I bought a rosemary plant and I told her that I had read about that if you smell rosemary, it helps regain your memory back. By 75%.

0:41:16
By 75%.

0:41:17
So I said, let's just get your rosemary.

0:41:18
So she gave it to me.

0:41:19
She said, I know you can't smell this, Brianna, but just inhale it.

0:41:20
So I took it and I took a deep, like a deep like sniff of it. And I said, oh my goodness. I said, mom, does it smell a little minty? And she goes, what? I said, a little bit. Yeah. Smell that. And I was like, yes. And my aunt, she gave me, because I was a little bit older, she gave me a rosemary. And I was like, oh my goodness.

0:41:30
I said, mom, does it smell a little minty?

0:41:31
And she goes, what?

0:41:32
I said, a little bit.

0:41:33
Yeah.

0:41:34
Smell that.

0:41:35
And I was like, yes. And my aunt, she gave me, because I still have really bad migraines. So she gave me this like essential oil that you just put on your nose and you rub on your temple through forehead and your chest. And I put it under my nose and I said, Oh my gosh, I can smell this too.

0:41:58
Wow.

0:41:59
What does that one smell like? Eucalyptus.

0:42:01
Eucalyptus and rosemary yeah so yeah so um yes is it I I feel that it is a miracle and that people should still believe because I mean it's she let you sit like you say people do ask her well didn't don't you ready to get this and don't you he might he works in mysterious ways he's not gonna he's not

0:42:24
a genie he's not gonna be like boom there's your sense of smell.

0:42:27
He said time heals all.

0:42:29
Exactly.

0:42:29
Yes.

0:42:30
Cause then also like, where's the faith in that, right? Like if we all get that instant gratification of things that we ask for, whether it's something as, as massive as, as your site, you're hearing your smell or something as, as small as like a blessing over like a job or something like that, right? It's, it's more about the faith than it is about the, the giving. Do you ever struggle with, either one of you, struggle with like why

0:42:54
it happened to begin with? Or do you feel like you're at peace with that? Because everything happens for a reason. So I asked God, what is the reason, why did I get into this accident? And he said, because before my accident I was not the best person. I was still really religious, but like... You were a good soul, she was just on the wrong path yeah he

0:43:17
said he when he brought me back to life he recreated me as a much better person

0:43:22
and that's what you y'all have been talking about with the personality changes and like Janet the neighbor and things like that everything kind of

0:43:29
makes sense right like we put everything I take take things and I put them in perspective and everything just seems to be like fitting in. Yeah. Like a puzzle, like, Oh my gosh, yes, this happened. Oh my gosh, this is, that's right. Now she's this and that, you know, and she's different and she does this. Yeah. The things she tells me that conversations she's had with God and I say, and I'm like, Oh my gosh, that makes a lot of sense. And she noticed, um, that my vocabulary has changed. She said she notices I use lots of vocabulary from the Bible, and I haven't read the Bible

0:44:04
since I've been home from the hospital.

0:44:06
She's never read the Bible, period.

0:44:08
Oh, yeah.

0:44:09
Wow.

0:44:10
I did.

0:44:11
But not the whole thing.

0:44:12
She said I used vocabulary from the Bible. And God had also told me that he brought me back to life, and he said he has a mission for me. And I said, oh, what is that mission? And he said, share your story and tell people that it was me that helped you. So I was like, okay, I will. And he said, you'll see what will happen with this. And I said, okay. So I told a couple of my friends this and I told them that it was God that helped me. And they said, oh my God, my friends were not religious. Some of them that I told this to, they said, oh my gosh, I think this is true. And I said, yes, it is true. And they said, what church do you go to? And I said, I go to St. Mary's Church in Elgin. And they said, Oh my gosh, I'm going to go there. I'm going to start going. And now they are very religious. So I'm getting people to start becoming religious.

0:45:03
Yeah, no, then. And I mean, this is just a testimony of that, right? Because I mean, I found, like I said, I found y'all on on tik tok, and I'm out here in Las Vegas, and I feel like the Lord led me to you and said, share her story. And so that's, here we are, you're doing it. So like that's, more people are gonna hear it, more listeners are gonna hear it, and it's gonna just keep hopefully spreading the faith and then the awareness as well, you know, like that's the other side of this is the medical awareness of what happens in trauma like this and how it wasn't just an overnight thing,

0:45:37
it's been a whole process so yeah. I also posted a TikTok. Okay. And it said me July 1st a year ago and then I posted a bunch of pictures of me in the hospital with my shaved head and then I posted me with my long hair at the gym working out and I said me today and it got um 271.5

0:45:57
thousand views. Wow. Just as many likes.

0:46:01
That's amazing.

0:46:02
You're still...

0:46:03
And then people told me to share my story of what happened. So I did a couple of videos of me like talking, explaining it, and those went viral as well.

0:46:12
Yeah.

0:46:13
So people like hearing about it. People are interested for sure. I think people are curious to see because there are so many, so many, so many people who know someone or themselves have been through a TBI or some kind of brain aneurysm or something that if it affects, because brain injuries, they're all like, like thumbprints. They're all different. Every brain injury is different. Some recuperate, some don't recuperate and some get a little bit of everything, you know, so they're all so different, but it's a huge community out there of people who are suffering or know someone who is suffering from this. And I feel like, I almost feel like there should be a group, like a support group to share your different ideas and stories because there were so many things that we did, that I personally did to help her, that I feel also helped her in the healing process. A lot of doctors didn't believe in the hyperbaric oxygen chamber, which is this chamber. It's just pure oxygen that gets pumped in. They put you in this tube, like a Michael Jackson tube. People will feel you in there, and they just pump you with oxygen. But the days that I would take her, she would come on, she was like a new person. She goes, Oh my God, I feel so good. I feel like I can do cartwheels, I can dance. And I go in there with a really bad migraine. I couldn't even walk on my ankle. And I'd come out, my migraine's gone, my head feels great. And I'm like running to the car. And those were the weeks that we saw huge progress. The week that I took her to hyperbaric oxygen, oxygen hyperbaric, those were the weeks that I saw the most improvement. And the doctors were like, no, no. Insurance didn't even cover it, but my husband and I were like, nope, we're gonna do it, we're gonna do it. And we did, and she did like 40 sessions. And I feel like that also helped a lot. I mean, there's just so many little things, little researches, even like natural stuff that you can do to help improve. Have you, Victoria, thought about maybe putting all this stuff together? I think I saw somebody on, again, on TikTok saying like, you should write a book or, you know, just about the journey in itself.

0:48:41
But have you had any thought about compiling everything into somewhere for others?

0:48:46
Absolutely. I mean, right now, there's like, my whole story is written on Facebook. I was thinking about taking all those pages, printing them out and adding to them, because those were like each individual day what I went through, what I was going through, what she was going through each and every day in detail from the hospital. So I take all of that and my story from beginning to end, I think I'd have myself a nice book.

0:49:15
Yeah, no, that's true. Yeah.

0:49:18
Definitely thinking about it, yes, for sure. I would love if I could even, I'd like to get it to the point where I would love to do a movie. I feel like reading a book is great, but watching it visually really hits home. I mean, we did a testimony at the church and I when I was at the church, I couldn't even hold the tears when I was talking about this. I've talked about it so much now that I'm a little more like, okay, I can I can, you know, but um, yeah, I feel like it would be a spectacular movie.

0:49:55
Yeah. No, I agree. I think Brianna, you have again, like the energy you bring, the just, you can tell that you're just so excited to share your story, which is, it's kind of, I guess if you're not a believer, it's bizarre, right? Because it's like, this is a traumatic thing. Why would you want to relive this? Why would you want to, like, well, don't you want to push forward? But both of y'all are so, so like, it feels like you're at peace. And you're like, this is our purpose now, is to spread this awareness and talk about it. And that's wonderful. I love that you both are doing that. The last thing that I wanted to ask, Brianna, you said it a couple times, and I just want to clarify for anyone listening, but you said that, did you actually, like, did they actually say she was dead at some point?

0:50:42
So they never told me at the hospital that she had zero brain activity. Because I think that they were all just hoping, and especially the doctor was hoping she was gonna pull through. But it was months after that I ran to her pediatrician at some barbecue, and we were talking, and she said to me, she goes, Victoria, I never told you this, but when I received the reports from the hospital, it was, she was diagnosed as brain dead, like no zero brain activity. Okay, so it was never told to me. Sure. Because I think the doctor was just in hopes that she would pull through. But the nurses would come in every half an hour with a little flashlight and check her pupils. And I thought I'm like, I didn't think anything of it. I saw them doing it and I'm like, did she have pupil movement? And they're like, oh no, none yet. So like three or four days went by before her pupils finally, because one of her pupils was so small and the other one was huge. And apparently that's a sign that there's no brain activity. I didn't know that. And when the nurse, one of the nurses finally came in like after the fourth day, and she goes, Oh my gosh, and she called like two of the other nurses, she goes, Do you see something? And they're like, Oh my gosh, it's tiny, but yes, I'm like, what, what? I was like, so excited, but I didn't know why. But it was because she was starting to get her brain activity back. Wow. Little did I know. I think that's what kind of kept me composed. Another thing that really helped me stay composed is, believe it or not, was social media. And another thing that I feel that is a miracle is, before my accident, I had this long, long,

0:52:39
long blonde hair.

0:52:40
Yes.

0:52:41
And they had to shave my head for my head surgery, so I was completely bald.

0:52:48
And when I got home, I was looking in the mirror, and I was so insecure.

0:52:52
I did not want to go

0:52:52
out I did not want to send anybody pictures I not want to do anything so I was praying to God asking him to help me to gain my confidence back or something and I woke up the next morning and I looked in the mirror and I just said to myself oh my gosh I actually look okay with this short hair like I don't look bad and I like started to become more confident, more confident every single day.

0:53:18
Yeah, because you do, you carry yourself with a confidence, like just in how you are. So how old are you now?

0:53:23
You're 18? I'm 18 now. He also told me, he said, Brianna, beauty is not about your physical appearance. And I said, what do you mean? I was so beautiful before. He goes, you're actually more beautiful because beauty comes from the inside, not from your physical appearance. He said, but you are truly beautiful on the inside. So you are beautiful. Don't think you're not. Oh my God. So that's what I tell everybody now. Beauty is in the inside.

0:53:52
Amazing. So amazing. I could talk to both of you all day. I love, I love just everything you're sharing. And I just really want to thank you for Brianna, your strength in telling your story and Victoria, your strength and just staying by her side and being an advocate for those out there who go through the TBI struggle. Is there anything else either one of you wants to add for any of the listeners before we

0:54:16
wrap it up?

0:54:17
Well, the only thing I want to just tell everybody is to, you know, stay positive always. if you go through this, just go into it with a positive attitude because positivity radiates and it only attracts more positivity. And you know, have faith because I had so much faith. I had people from other countries like Australia and Mexico texting me saying, we heard your daughter's story. We have a prayer chain going here for you. So many churches dedicated masses to me.

0:54:55
Oh wow.

0:54:56
Keeping your faith strong and never giving up and staying by your injured person's life, staying with them 24-7. And one other thing super important that I wish I would have done is don't forget about the siblings. You know, I have another daughter and I wish I could have, I was so focused on her, that she was kind of like, drifting away, you know, yeah, we always had to leave her with somebody while we were in the hospital. And it's so important to stay connected with them and make them part of this because they're also part of the healing process as well. That's beautiful advice. Yes. Is your other daughter doing okay? She is now. She still has a little bit of struggles with her because the personality are different and she says, I want my old sister back. That's the hardest part.

0:55:51
Before the accident, my sister and I were so close. We were best friends. And now she says I'm too, quote unquote, mature now. She's 18, 14.

0:56:05
Yeah, so there's a little gap, but, you know, with a little bit of therapy and love.

0:56:12
Yeah, exactly.

0:56:13
And as you grow, you know, I've got sisters and we all go through that in that phase of just life where you're like, okay, you're a little too mature for me now. Right. Brianna, anything you want to say before we end everything? Anything else you want to say?

0:56:32
I can't think of anything else.

0:56:34
I think I'm okay.

0:56:35
Okay.

0:56:36
Well, thank you both so, so much.

0:56:38
I appreciate you. I hope the listeners got something out of this. I'm sure they did because it's a fantastic, wonderful story. Keep doing what you're doing and let us know if you end up doing that book or movie. There you have it. That is the story of Brianna told by herself and her mother Victoria. Thank you again, ladies, both of you being so open and honest with this story. Like I said in the beginning, this was something that was set on my heart. Medical miracles are something that I personally have found so fascinating throughout my life and I'm so blessed to have been able to hear this account firsthand. If you missed any part of this episode or if you just want to hear it again or maybe share it with a friend, you can always catch these episodes on a podcast form. Anywhere you listen to your podcast, you just have to search OK, but seriously, I am your host, Vanessa Lauren. If you like listening live, I appreciate that. Thank you so much. Again, you're listening to 91.5, the Rebel HG2, KUNV. Before I let you go this evening, it wouldn't be my show if I didn't hit you with some statistics. You know how much I love them numbers. So one of the things I want to touch on is traumatic brain injury. That's what Brianna suffers from. That's what you heard her mother talking about. There should be a little bit more awareness about that. So I pulled up some numbers from the CDC. I know we all have our mixed feelings about the CDC right now in the pandemic, but just put those feelings aside for a second. They are a credited source, and they do have the statistics for this particular thing. So traumatic brain injury, also known as TBI, is actually the leading cause of death and disability among children and young adults. Now, if you're like me, I thought, well, why is that? And then when I did some more research and looked into it, it's because this is something that happens from very reckless behavior. Not to say that the children and young adults are being irresponsible, but the leading cause of TBI, for example, is motorcycle accidents. Not exactly something that your six-year-old grandma is doing, right? So it's just the more reckless someone is, the more risk, and also the younger the brain is, the skull is still developing, all of that. So it is higher in younger people. This is just the United States. Of course, the CDC only talks about the United States. Each year, there are about 1.5 million Americans who sustain a TBI. Let's just let that sink in. 1.5 million, that's so many people. The numbers from that, 230,000 of those 1.5 million people are hospitalized and do survive. 50,000 people die right on point, right on site when it happens. 80 to 90,000 people experience the long-term disability. So that can be something super severe. You heard Brianna share about how she had to relearn how to walk, she had to relearn how to talk. Victoria explained that she was in an extreme autistic state at one point in time. So some people never make it past those disabilities. They stay in those states. They don't always make an amazing recovery like Brianna has. So those are the numbers. I just wanted to give those to you all before I left you this evening. And then the other part of Brianna's story, the miracle part of her story, that she says she can speak to the Lord and she's been able to speak to the Lord And she saw him This is not the first time we've heard something like this This is something that has happened in the past You can give it a search on online see all the many many stories of people who have said that they've either had a near-death Experience and seen the Lord spoken to the Lord or they've actually died and and come back Take it for what it's worth whatever you believe, but these are things that have really happened. You heard Brianna share her truth. This is her story. This is what happened to her. The one thing I do want to point out is the painting that her and her mother brought up. They talked about a picture that Victoria pulled online of all the different versions of God that people have seen and how Brianna was able to point out that one specific photo. That specific photo was painted, if you don't know, by a child prodigy. Her name is Akiyana. She was four years old at the time. This happened back in 1998, somewhere around there. Four years old. And this is not, if you've seen this painting, if you haven't, go look it up right now. It is jaw-dropping. This is not your average four-year-old painting. This is amazing, amazing work. So that is the picture of God that Brianna was referencing. I just wanted to give you guys that information. Okay, that's it. I'm done. I know it's been a lot of talking. I appreciate you sticking with us the whole time. If you did, again, this is the I'm Vanessa, this is okay. But seriously, have a great night. I'm gonna get you back to your music now. have a great night. I'm gonna get you back to your music now. All right. Bye. See you next week.

Transcribed with Cockatoo