Still Stuck With Chronic PCS? Recovery Needs Meaning
In this 20‑minute monologue, concussion survivor and coach David Brimacombe argues that chronic post‑concussion syndrome (PCS) recovery stalls when a person’s underlying "why" – the deep, personal reason for getting better – is weak. He explains that symptoms become mere stop‑signs when motivation is low, but become useful information when a strong purpose drives the brain to view new strategies as safe. Drawing on his own experience of seven concussions over 20 years, David recounts a rock‑bottom moment when he broke his hand after an outburst with his daughter, which forced him to confront his identity and crystallize a powerful why: to be a better, responsible parent. He then outlines a practical roadmap for creating and reinforcing a compelling why, including: (1) identifying a purpose that feels as heavy as a semi‑truck pulling you out of a ditch; (2) daily breathwork, gratitude journaling, and visualization/manifestation exercises; (3) rehearsing present‑tense positive statements (e.g., “I am a caring father”); (4) embedding the why into subconscious loops via vivid mental rehearsal, sticky‑note reminders, and sharing the why with loved ones. David stresses that the why must be external‑focused, concrete, and repeatedly activated, otherwise new therapies, supplements, or routines will feel threatening and cause setbacks. He concludes by urging viewers to write down their why now, keep it top‑of‑mind, and use it as the foundational pull that enables consistent effort throughout the recovery journey.
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When your why is weak, symptoms become stop signs. However, when your why is strong, those same symptoms—they become information. Hi, my name is David Brimacombe, and after seven concussions over twenty years, I learned that you need to start with a why for your recovery before you obsess over the how and the what. Now, most people with persistent. Post-concussion symptoms. They are constantly asking questions like, what do I need, need to do to get better? What is the newest supplement, the newest protocol, therapy, the specialist that I need to go and see? They're checking on Reddit, on Facebook, watching videos. Okay, now herein lies the problem. All that is well and good— becoming informed, becoming educated in creating certain protocols and systems that will help you recover. It's all well and good. The problem lies is that when you start implementing those and they don't work out as you would assume they would, they're not as powerful, they're not as quick, the response. Okay, what happens? You fall off. You realize it. Maybe this isn't for me. Maybe this is not the right supplement. Maybe this isn't the right protocol. Or maybe I'm just not meant to recover. Now, all those things are massive roadblocks. They could be brick walls that stop you for an extended period of time or forever, partly not only because maybe that supplement isn't for you in that moment or too much too soon, but more than likely it's because you don't have a strong enough reason, a strong enough pull that will pull you through those tough days, that will get you through that initial part of your Recovery. Now, this isn't meant to be toxic positivity. This isn't meant to come off of someone who has recovered as, hey, look at me, I've recovered and it was just so easy, all I needed to do was— I'm trying to provide a roadmap for you on this channel. I'm trying to give you the things that I wish I knew 5 years ago, 10 years ago, 15 years ago. It was 20-plus years since that first concussion. In those 20 years, I learned so much about myself, so much about my symptoms, about understanding my body and how it reacts to certain things. But the thing I learned that was one of, if not the most impactful thing, was that I needed a reason to recover. Now that might seem strange. I mean, everyone wants to feel better. Everyone wants to get back to the person they were, or even better so, become a better version. But it's not that simple, okay? Your brain is constantly trying to keep you safe. So anytime you implement a new strategy, a new system, and you feel those— that resistance in your nervous system, that anxiety, that tension, that basically your body telling you we need to stop this, it's not because it fears that this is actually going to cause you harm, but it's going against your previous identity. It's going against what you were doing for so so long, what you were doing when you were stuck in that state of recovery. Okay, now you're trying something new. Your brain feels that this is a threat to you, so it's going to send off all the alarm bells. Okay, if I have a why, if I have a reason to motivate myself, to pull me through, to provide evidence to my brain, to my nervous system, that this is safe, I am supported, I am actually moving in the right direction, Okay, my healing becomes stalled, becomes stagnated. Okay, in this video, I want to go through the importance of creating a why for your recovery, and more importantly, how can I start? What do I do? How do I create that why that is so powerful that even on those darkest days, even on those days that you are lying in bed, sitting on the edge of your bed wondering, how am I going to do this today? How How am I going to adult and be a semi-functioning part of society? For me, it was, how am I going to be a parent? How am I going to go to work when I can hardly get out of bed? Now, before my why, that struggle was intense. It was a day-to-day basis. After it, as I'm going to mention, it became a lot easier. So in my recovery, one of the things that I found was a core problem, a core issue that I had to deal with was that I was constantly concerned with adding more routines, supplements, therapies, and seeing specialists in hopes that if I have enough, that they'll find the miracle cure. They'll find that silver bullet that makes those— all those symptoms go away, disappear, allow me to go back to the person I want to be. Now the problem is I didn't have a mission. I didn't have a reason So anytime I had a setback, a minor symptom provocation where I just did not feel like I had the capacity to do what I needed to do, I stopped. I didn't stop because I didn't want to get better. I stopped because in that moment, okay, in that very, very moment, the issues were too substantial. The pull from a why that didn't exist Wasn't great enough. Okay, I envision this like you're stuck in the mud. Maybe for me, living in a northern climate, you're driving on some rural roads and you hit the ditch when you're driving your car in the winter. Okay, now if a car drives by that's not very big, it tries to pull you out. It can't, doesn't have the torque, doesn't have the capacity. The same applies to your reasoning, your whys. If your why isn't substantial enough, Like, I want to be better. I want to be able to work out. I want to be able to eat what I want to eat. I want to be able to get up and feel good. Those are okay. Those are very minor whys. So that is like your Honda Civic coming by and trying to pull you out of that ditch. Okay? What you need is a Ford F-150. You need a semi-truck. You need someone who is going to rip you out of that ditch on those darkest days. You need a reason, okay? Your reason has to be substantial. Now, I want to go through how I created my why. Now, it was substantial, it was profound, it was, I would say, a cathartic moment of my recovery. Now, I find that people typically turn to recovery or, or find their recovery roadmap for one of two ways. First is inspiration. They become inspired by someone. They see someone who's done it. And they follow them perfectly fine. The other way is through desperation. We call this rock bottom. You are at the base of your recovery. You can't get any lower, okay? And this is the point that I was at. I was at a point of desperation. Now understand that one of the things that was— that affected me the most during my recovery is that I was incredibly emotionally volatile. I could not handle stress. When I got up, I think of The stress in my body as a glass of water, it was 3/4 full. So any little thing, that thing was overflowing. I was overflowing. I was like volcanic, a volcano ready to erupt at any given second. So here's the situation. My children were younger. They always needed someone to sit outside their door while they were trying to fall asleep. It was a comfort thing. It was a safety thing. And it would— and most nights it was perfectly Fine. Now, this one night, my daughter had substantial troubles falling asleep. It had been half an hour, 45 minutes, and I could feel my frustration was building. That cup was overflowing, but I didn't dig into it. I didn't figure out a way to solve it. So finally she said, Dad, I can't go to sleep. Dad, I need water. Dad, I need to go to the bathroom. At that moment, I erupted. I started yelling and screaming. There happened to be a wooden stool next to me that I was I actually ironically had a glass of water on. Okay. I turned to it and I took my fist and I punched the side of the stool in the process, breaking my hand. Okay. All across, all the knuckles on my hand, broken, fractured. That day, again, it took me a while to kind of resolve those issues and understand the clarity coming from that situation. But that day was my rock bottom. That day was me understanding that I had become a person. that was so foreign from who I wanted to be. And I had now created a why. My why was to be the best version of myself for my children, because I could not be that person anymore. I could not role model, okay, that behavior, that aggression, that negativity to them anymore. It was causing them harm. So my why in that moment, when I was walking around in a cast, people asking, what happened? You know, did you fall and hurt yourself? Was it a sporting accident? I had to be truthful with him and say, I punched a stool. And I had to live with that, that frustration, that, that feeling that, what am I doing? This is not who I am. And through that process, it was probably one of the greatest things that ever happened to me, because through that process, I determined that I need to be responsible. for my recovery. And the only way I could be responsible is if I create a why so powerful that on even my darkest days, it will pull me through. My children, my children's future, that's what pulled me through. I'd get up, I'd feel terrible, I gotta get up, I gotta do my breathwork, I gotta do my gratitude journaling, I gotta be the best version of myself even when I struggle. And again, this isn't trying to accuse you that you just don't have the motivation, the momentum in your recovery. You might not have a substantial enough why. I— it took me years to figure this out. Years of struggling, of going through the same symptoms, getting up, ah, as soon as I got up I wanted to go back to bed, until that why came. Because we know that if you, if you've— if you're a parent, you're a teacher, you have younger siblings, you understand that children learn by what is caught, not what is taught. They were learning by what I was doing, getting frustrated by little things, angry at little things. That was becoming their baseline. That was becoming their understanding of how someone parents. I couldn't do that anymore. Okay, that wasn't fair to them. So that was my North Star. So it was that F-350 pulling me out of the muck every time I felt like I couldn't do it. It would rip me out of there because it wasn't for me. Now, most people say in goal setting you want to make your goals intrinsic. You want to make sure that you are intrinsically motivated. It's something internal. In this case, I feel it is almost more powerful to have those whys as external. Okay, there's something beyond you. See, in those days where I was struggling, if it was just for me to be a better person, to be the best version of myself, I could sleep in. I could just lie there and roll around and Um, not get up. But if it's for someone else, if it's for my children, I'm getting up. Doesn't matter. I'm getting up because that pull is greater. So the most important part of this video now is how do I create that why and how do I keep that top of mind? Now, it's one thing to create a why, but this has to be something that your brain rehearses, that it understands. Now, your subconscious loop, which runs about 95% of your thoughts. I think of it like the elevator music playing in your mind all the time. It's not top of mind, but it runs a good portion of your life, a good portion of your actions and your decisions and how you think of yourself. So if we can change that subconscious loop from someone who is struggling with post-concussion syndrome, is frustrated, is angry, is always stressed out, to someone who is working towards becoming a better person, who is doing this for his children, or for whoever, whatever your why is, that is going to change your recovery. So we need to change that internal state, that internal dialogue that is going to influence how you behave, okay, during your recovery. Now, I have found that the most profound way to do this is through manifestation, through visualization. Understand about manifestation and visualization is that you have to tell yourself Quite often that you are someone, not you would like to become something, or that you are not something else. There's no negatives here. It's only present tense positives. I am a caring husband. I am a caring father. I am in control of my emotions. Whatever the case may be, you're going to remind yourself as many times as you need to. First thing when you get up, when you start to feel that frustration kick in, Nope, not gonna happen. I'm gonna stop that train of thought. I'm gonna rehearse that positive that I'm gonna input. I am blank. Okay, that's super important. Now, the second part of this is how you're gonna do this, is you have to visualize yourself in that state. So I'm going to tell myself I am a caring father. Then I'm going to think about this. I'm going to visualize myself treating my children the way they should be treated. Okay, my daughter has that moment where she can't fall asleep. That's okay. I'm going to tuck her in again, remind her that she's safe, that I'll sit outside for however long it takes. Okay, I am creating safety in myself by creating safety in her in that situation. I am now instilling that why so deep. Okay, I'm creating that neural pathway. Understand that your brain cannot tell the difference between something that has been vividly imagined, vividly imagined multiple times, and something that has actually occurred. So the more often I'm able to rehearse this in my mind, okay, I'm closing my eyes and I'm thinking about how I'm actually— and you have to use as much detail as possible— how you tuck her in, what you say to her. Maybe you kiss her on the forehead, you go turn the light switch off. You close the door, you sit down. What book are you going to read? Okay, how are you going to drink your water? What's going to be going on outside? Maybe there's a radio going on in the background. Every little nuance. Because what's that— what that is doing is that is teaching your brain that this is a safe environment. I can walk towards it. I can move towards that new me because I've rehearsed it in my mind. It is safe. Your brain is constantly trying to stop all those Signs and symptoms, things that could be dangerous. It is thought to be dangerous by your brain if it is new, if it is foreign, if it is novel. If you've walked that path already, you've ingrained that neural pathway in your mind, it is not dangerous. It is where you're going to become. It's where you're going to go. Okay. This is what I found. I would do this first thing in the morning. I'd get up, do a little bit of breathwork, and I'd visualize my perfect day. Visualize acting in a way that I knew I could do. I am— I would go ahead and visualize it. After that point, I'd live out my day. If I struggled, I would use that rehearsal of my, um, I am— I am a caring father. I am a tolerant person. I can handle stress. Then before bed, I would do the exact opposite of what I did when I woke up. I would go ahead, visualize myself in that perfect state, do my breathwork, close my eyes, and go to bed. I would rinse, repeat. Again, like everything else I'm going to talk about in this channel, you need to start small and then scale later. Convince yourself this is possible. Understand that your why is not a decorative thing, a thing to kind of think about and hope for. It is the crux of your recovery. It is the focal point. It is something that you have to nail down and remind yourself. That is why this is video 1 for my new podcast, okay, that I'm putting out, because I want you to understand you need to start with this today. After you've listened to this podcast, after you watch this video, however you're taking this information in, I want you to go ahead and I want you to write down, what is my why? Make it so strong that it's going to pull you to anything. Remind yourself, tell the person. I told my kids, okay? You are the reason why I'm trying to recover. Remind them so they can tell you in that moment. You don't feel like getting up, you don't feel like doing what you need to do, they will remind you. Put a sticky on the mirror, do anything you can, okay? This is going to help you. This is going to start that and create momentum that you can then layer on, okay? If you can't start, you can't finish your recovery. So the goal of today is to get you understand the power of why. Don't obsess over your how and your what, okay? What to do next, what supplements to add until you understand why am I really doing this. I hope you enjoyed this video. I appreciate you listening to the end. If you haven't already, please like, subscribe, review, okay? This gets this channel out to more people who need this information. This is the thing that I learned that was so substantial in my recovery is that I could make changes in my life These are things that are free. Okay? I could change my thoughts. That would change my destiny. I'm glad you're here. Let's start this together. Have yourself a great day.
