Brain injury support group offers safety in numbers

Had the horrific collision George Handgis survived back in 2012 left him with broken bones or a collapsed lung or — heaven forbid — even a serious spinal injury, perhaps it would be easier for people to understand.

Instead, Handgis suffered traumatic brain injury. He spent two months in a coma, underwent multiple brain surgeries and endured countless hours of rehabilitative therapy. The external scars are readily apparent; the ones that linger most meaningfully do not.

And thus the timid avert their eyes and speak as if he is not there. Thus, the bolder suggest, not always politely, that perhaps Handgis should wear a hat so as not to alarm the faint of heart.

And thus comes that most well-intentioned of assurances: "I know what you’re going through."

"When people say that, they mean it from the bottom of their heart," says Handgis, 62. "But the truth is they don’t know."

For people like Handgis, the sense of being alone in their suffering can intensify what is already a moment-by-moment challenge of coping not just with pain, lack of muscle control and other physical ails, but with emotional highs and lows, ebbs and flows of lucidity, the grasp for words, and the unreliability of memory.

A similar sense of isolation makes weightier the sometimes lonely work of spouses, children and others who devote their lives to caring for loved ones with TBI.

Fortunately for Handgis, and for his wife, Sharon, and many other TBI survivors and their caretakers, the Kona Brain Injury Support Group, started 20 years ago by certified rehabilitation registered nurse and nurse life care planner Karen Klemme, offers a monthly opportunity to speak freely and share experiences with others who truly do know what they are going through.

Handgis, once a highly sought-after corporate keynote speaker, recalls the first time he spoke before the group.

"I was anxious, but that changed as soon as I made eye contact with the survivors and their spouses and caregivers," Handgis says. "I saw a special connection. Fifteen minutes turned into an hour, and afterward I got hugs and thanks and even a few tears. I felt accepted."

Safe in the company of their comrades in day-by-day recovery, group members dish openly on their concerns and experiences.

"People drop the walls, and you can see their hearts and souls," Handgis said. "There’s compassion, but it’s not expressed in any kind of corny way. We talk about everything from balance to headaches to incontinence."

Handgis never knows what to expect from each new day, but he knows how he and Sharon will handle it.

"We’re on a journey together to try and get a little better every day, to adjust to a new normal and establish a new paradigm," Handgis says.

The Kona Brain Injury Support Group is hosting a free open house at 6 p.m. Wednesday at Hawaiian Rehabilitative Services, 75-165 Hualalai Road, Kailua-Kona. For more information, call 328-9498 or 329-0591.

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Reach Michael Tsai at mtsai@staradvertiser.com.