Mississippi teen recovers from traumatic brain injury, defying expectations
By Allie Ware
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JACKSON, Mississippi (WAPT) — A Mississippi teenager is defying expectations after surviving a traumatic brain injury and multiple life-threatening injuries from a January accident.
On Jan. 3, 17-year-old Landyn Simmerman was accidentally hit by a vehicle while helping a friend who had wrecked. The accident left him with a traumatic brain injury and his family was preparing for the worst.
Simmerman suffered a broken pelvis, femur, hip, ribs, facial fractures, two collapsed lungs, and a stroke. Doctors performed a craniectomy, removing half of his skull to relieve pressure on his brain.
Simmerman was placed in an induced coma for two weeks before being moved to Atlanta for specialized inpatient physical therapy and weeks of medical treatment.
“It’s been a little scary. The surgeries are not fun at all,” Simmerman said.
Doctors warned that recovering from a traumatic brain injury would be a long road, but Simmerman applied his competitive nature to his recovery, amazing his doctors and family.
“He was very determined through this whole thing, even when he was hurting really bad, he was determined to keep going and get better,” his mother, Britney Parker, said.
“All the recovery times they gave us, I cut them in half,” Simmerman added.
As part of his recovery, Simmerman underwent multiple surgeries, including having a custom skull created to replace the part of his own that was removed.
“They made me a fake skull and put me to sleep and put it in and screwed it in,” he said.
Although Simmerman does not remember the accident or his time in the hospital, his progress has been remarkable.
“We don’t take a single breath for granted anymore,” Parker said.
Doctors have said it could take up to a year for his brain to fully heal, and Simmerman has learned that the effects of brain injuries are not always visible to others.
“It takes time for your brain to heal,” Parker said. “We have also learned that effects from brain injuries don’t always look visible to other people.”
This fall, Simmerman will start his senior year of high school and is looking forward to returning to normal teenage activities.
“Driving, playing baseball, and getting back to school and just being normal, normal life,” he said.
The scars remain, and so do some challenges, but Simmerman’s determination to keep going has been unwavering.
This month, Simmerman completed his outpatient physical therapy program and is now focusing on speech therapy to ensure his cognitive abilities are fully regained.
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