Annistyn Griffins TBI story

Growing up in a small rural town, many families use ATV’s and golf carts as their way of
transportation through farmland and fields. For a small-town girl like me, going to high
school that is in the middle of nowhere, there is only a small percentage of kids who grew
up in suburban areas, but I found myself becoming friends with a few. As I became
closer to these girls, I invited them over one night and wanted to go on a golf cart ride to
show these city girls the country.

As my sister was driving and I was giving a tour, I did not realize she would be taking
a turn, and as she did, I fell out of the moving golf cart. When I fell, my head took the
impact and I became unconscious. Once I woke up, I was surrounded by my friends
and my parents, as they were waiting for the ambulance to arrive. In this moment I had
no idea what had happened, but I knew something was wrong, I was in extreme pain
and when I touched the back of my head, I could feel my skull had become swollen to
the size of a baseball. As soon as the EMT’s arrived they realized how severe an injury I
most likely had and rushed me to the Tampa General Hospital as fast as they could.

Once I arrived at the hospital a team of nurses and a neurologist were waiting for me,
they got right to work sending me to scans like MRI’s and Xrays, trying to assess my
injuries. Once the scans were viewed the neurologist told my mom that I had a
Traumatic Brain Injury, 3 brain bleeds, a skull fracture, and a severe concussion.

In this moment not only my life but my families life felt like it had been shattered into a
million pieces. We had no clue what my life would look like moving forward, would I
have permanent brain damage? Would I need surgery? How long would this injury
affect me if it were not permanent? My neurologist unfortunately could not answer all
these questions for my family because they were having to study my brain movement
over the course of the next 72 hours. As time went on the doctors made my family
aware that I should come out of this okay, but I would need to do many check-ins, and
doctor visits to be sure. My journey to recovery was not easy and had many struggles, I
had days where I would feel a world wind of emotions and struggled with mental battles
due to my brain bleeds being on my frontal lobe; the emotions I would feel were
completely out of my control and I often felt stuck and alone. Now it has been three
years since my TBI and I have tried to educate myself on the rising cases of TBI’s each
year.

I am so thankful that my injury was not permanent, and I was able to recover, but I
know in many cases there are families out there that are not as lucky and are
devastated at the outcomes of these injuries on their loved ones. I hope by sharing my
story I will help advocate for golfcart and ATV safety. This injury could have been

avoided if seatbelts or helmets were worn, however hindsight is always 20-20. I am
thankful that I went through what I did because now it has given me a platform to speak
for others that cannot and bring awareness to these tragic accidents.