Sarah* was fascinated with the brain from the time she was a little girl. She remembers asking her father to buy her a set of headphones and a computer game she heard about where she could move digital boxes around on the screen by using her mind. “It was exciting to me that what I was doing was more than a game,” she recalled.
Eleven-year-old Oliver is still a “smarty pants,” says his mom Lorena with a smile, but the tornado he used to impersonate is long gone. Diagnosed several years ago with ADHD, he remains very active but isn’t “over the top” anymore when it comes to being distracted – and exasperating.
No longer hearing complaints from school about her son,
“Anika” was exhausted. Every night she spent two hours sitting at a table with her son, 14-year-old “Sai,” reading and explaining his homework assignments to him.
Clean clothes piled up, unfolded, on the laundry room table. Dirty dishes from dinner sat in the sink unwashed. (She just had to stop looking). And by the time Anika made it to the gym,
“My skin was crawling. I was sick to my stomach all the time and my whole body felt like it was shocking me.”
That’s how “Aaron*” described the debilitating and tortuous months when he was so engulfed by the flames of sudden-onset anxiety that he couldn’t sleep, stopped eating, and shut out everything and everyone he cared about.
“Christine” and her husband were at their wit’s end with their 17-year old son “Alex”.
Despite having a high I.Q. he was failing in school. He couldn’t make friends. He was uncooperative at home and would explode in anger without provocation. His room was a mess. He was addicted to video games. He argued violently with his parents whenever they asked him to do something.
On almost any given day you can watch Sandra Waldron joyfully sweeping her grandkids into her arms, bargain-hunting with her daughter at the mall, checking out specials in the grocery store or preparing elaborate meals and baked goods for her friends and family.
In fact, to see her today you’d never suspect that for most of her adult life she endured physical agony so extreme that she couldn’t do any of those ordinary activities.
“Nora”* wasn’t much fun to be around for her husband and children. A high-powered personal injury attorney, she never stopped thinking about work, even on the weekends when she should have been relaxing and enjoying her family.
“I was worrying all the time and couldn’t get calm enough to be present for my family,” she said.
Willow Rossi went into occupational therapy because she wanted to help children. Ironically, pursuing her passion thrust her into a nightmarish decade where no matter what she did, she wasn’t able to help herself.
Her life ravaged by fatigue and chronic pain, Willow finally experienced relief – and the chance for a more normal life – after finding her way to the Center for Brain Training.
For 30 years Helen Kaufman lived in fear of migraine headaches and their potential to strike at any time…but not anymore. Ask Helen how often she worries about getting a migraine headache and she’ll tell you: hardly ever.
After undergoing neurofeedback training at the Center for Brain Training, she’s nearly migraine-free.
Helen,
April had suffered debilitating symptoms for over nine years since an illness left her with a severe traumatic brain injury (TBI). After just six weeks of neurofeedback, she experienced significant improvement. This interview with April, her daughter, and Mike Cohen of Center for Brain explores the power neurofeedback can have in people’s lives,