“Dad has become a different person since the accident”
On 2nd December 2022 Dusty Zeisberger will be challenging himself both mentally and physically by running for 24 hours on a treadmill in support of Headway.
He is raising vital funds to help us to support people with brain injuries as well as their families.
Recently in Dusty’s family, this cause hit home in a big way when his father suffered a fall and experienced a traumatic brain injury.
“Before my dad acquired his brain injury, he was an extremely independent, active and caring individual. He worked for Mercedes Benz for 52 years and has been a musician since he was a teenager playing multiple instruments and singing in bands.
“He retired a few years before the injury and had plans to retire in Germany and travel Europe, living a life of adventure and relaxation.
“This has just shown me how quickly our abilities can be taken away from us.”
“In April 2022, Dad was carrying a speaker down a hill by himself, when he slipped, fell down the hill, and hit his head on the roof of a building at the bottom.
Dusty’s father suffered a bleed to the brain and was put in a medically induced coma for four days to aid recovery. He then spent a further four months in hospital.
“He couldn’t speak or move for two weeks. After that he began to make noises and then roughly speak. He is still mostly paralysed on his right side and struggles to think clearly or to communicate what he is feeling.
“He is currently suffering from depression, which has impacted his relationships with his partner and with my brother. There are often outbursts of anger and frustration, which I must assume are due to the feelings of helplessness.
“My dad is currently in a nursing home. He desperately wants to leave and live in his own home again, but there is not enough support at home for his condition.
“He recently started being able to shuffle with his ‘bad’ leg but fell over, so his confidence is low, and he is scared to try walk again.
“Dad has become a different person since the accident in terms of communication and thinking. He has now been diagnosed with carpal tunnel in the wrist that he can move, so his chances of living semi-independently are very small.”
Dusty has seen the struggle for his dad and his family firsthand from not only a physical injury, but also the mental health impact following a brain injury.
“I‘ve always believed that we are capable of so much more than we believe. This has just shown me how quickly our abilities can be taken away from us.
Dusty will be documenting his journey over the next few weeks, he will be sharing more of his story and what is happening in his family, and he would love you to follow his journey and support him along the way.
“I‘ll be taking the treadmill for a spin for 24 hours to show myself and everyone else what we are capable of. This is something small that I can do to raise money for those that can’t. So, I am doing this because I can, because some people just can’t anymore.”
You can make a donation on Dusty's fundraising page and follow his journey on Instagram, Facebook, YouTube and TikTok by searching for "Dusty Zeisberger" or @thedustycoach
24 Hour Treadmill Run For Headway UK (Traumatic Brain Injury Survivors)
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foreign
on a treadmill if I'm honest with you probably not
so on the 2nd of December 2022 I'm going to be taking on the challenge of running by myself on the trade mall for 24 hours this is my dad his name is Horst he's German he grew up in Germany but he raised us in the beautiful country of South Africa growing up he's always just been such a strong person he's done so much in his life he's always been active he's woken up early to go to work early and take us to school spend a long day at work and then fetch us from Sports after school no matter what the bad things are that maybe your mom or your dad has done throughout their lives you can always look back and think they've done so many things right to make you into the person that you are today he's just one of those people that has always been independent and always wanted to do everything himself not one of those people that would ever ask for help because he can do so much unfortunately
earlier this year his independent attitude got the best of him and he suffered a fall which caused him to get a traumatic brain injury seeing something like this happen to someone so close to me and someone that I look up to was really really difficult for myself my brother my sister and my mom on top of that it's been quite difficult because my dad is in Germany I'm in the UK my sister and my mom are in South Africa so it's been quite difficult for all of us in different ways I've been fortunate enough to go and visit my dad once but I haven't really been there enough for his recovery so I want to do this as a way of dealing with things and also supporting those people who are in less fortunate situations than us seeing
someone that's always been active his whole life and always prided himself on being able to do everything I mean my dad is over 70 years old now he's had a knee replacement he's had multiple heart attacks and he will still go and chop wood in the forest to heat his house in the winter luckily he is on his way to recovery now he is starting to be able to walk but when he was in a medically induced coma for about two days we never knew where the situation was going to end up he wasn't able to speak at the beginning which was the most scary thing that's ever happened to me in my life after a few weeks he was able to speak a
little bit more than before but still it wasn't just as quick and coherent as it was before progress has been slow but it has been happening and I do believe that there is hope for everyone that suffered from a traumatic brain injury before for that reason I'm raising awareness and money for Headway UK the charity that helps people that have suffered from traumatic brain injuries for their families and their carers I've written these stats down because it's quite difficult to remember but there were 356 699 UK admissions to the hospital with acquired brain injuries in 2019 and 2020 running the nurse-led helpline costs 500 pounds per day
2480 pounds per week and 10 740 pounds per month that's just to talk to someone to help the people that have suffered from brain injuries now imagine how much it costs to actually care for those people and to create the facilities that they need to actually get by in life we understand estimate the amount of activity that we can do we underestimate what we can do in life and I truly believe that every single person watching this right now can do so much more than they think that they can so I'm doing this because I can and I believe that so many of you can do more than you think for those of you who know anyone that suffered from a traumatic brain injury you would know that the event just doesn't affect you physically but it affects the person that you are you're still the same person deep inside but you can't express things the way you could before so on the 2nd of December
2022 I'm going to be running by myself on a treadmill for 24 hours at NRG Manchester I'm going to be leaving my donation Link in the bio for you to donate if you want there's no pressure but if you do donate feel free to click on the Spotify link and you can add some songs to my playlist for while I'm running and for while I'm training
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