Living with a brain injury
Life changed for the Chiefari family last October. Mary's 29-year-old son David flipped his car and hit a pole head-on. David suffered a traumatic brain injury. He fractured his left temporal bone and right frontal lobe. Mom Lynn Lettieri said, "He was bleeding from both ears, and he had tubes down his mouth, and they had put a chest tube in because his lung had collapsed." Brother Jim Chiefari said, "They were doing certain tests, and they didn't get responses from him, and at the time he was not showing them reflex responses." The coma lasted two and a half months. The recovery is a traumatic process in itself. Shock and disbelief changes to coping before the final stage of moving on. The biggest challenge is understanding the healing time.
