In this personal video, David Brimacombe shares his experience of living with seven concussions over two decades and the frustration of receiving normal MRI/CT results despite persistent post-concussion syndrome (PCS) symptoms. He explains that concussions are functional injuries affecting autonomic regulation, hormone balance, and blood flow, which standard imaging cannot capture. Brimacombe critiques the medical model that often dismisses patients when scans are clean, emphasizing the gap between physician interpretation and patient reality. He argues that recovery hinges on the patient taking active control, using small, incremental lifestyle changes—such as daily breathwork, gratitude practice, and gradual habit stacking—to reshape identity and harness neuroplasticity. He offers a concrete, actionable starter plan and invites viewers to join his upcoming PCS Resilience Collective, a guided community where he serves as a mentor while participants become the heroes of their own recovery. The video blends personal narrative, scientific explanation, and motivational coaching to empower those with lingering concussion symptoms.
Chapters
If your MRI or CT scan comes back normal, comes back inconclusive of any evidence that you have a traumatic brain injury, this doesn't mean that you're making it up. Hi, my name is David Brimacombe, and after 7 concussions over 20 years, I learned that scans are great. They're great for determining brain bleeds and fractures of the skull. What they're not great for are determining if you have a concussion, or in many cases still have lingering symptoms of a concussion and have PCS, or post-concussion syndrome. In this video, I want to go through why scans cannot determine your concussive state and what is one thing you could do today that is going to catapult your PCS recovery. Let's begin. So if you were anything like me at the start of my recovery journey, The first thing I wanted to do is I wanted to go see a specialist, someone who specialized in the brain, a neurologist who could run all the scans, the blood work, to determine what was the state of my brain. Was it damaged beyond repair? Was it showing any visible signs that there was any significant damage? So I went, I eventually got my MRI, and what came back was that everything was clean. Everything was normal. And with that, the neurologist told me that there is nothing at this point I can do for you. Now, this is not to say that every neurologist, every physician, every specialist is going to have this same interpretation. But the biggest thing you need to understand is that a concussion is not a structural injury. It is not going to show up necessarily on any kind of scan that you take. What it is, is it is a functional injury of your your brain and all the subsequent systems of your body. It changes how your hormones regulate through your system. It changes your autonomic nervous system, how the blood flows. These are not things that are going to be detected on an MRI or a CT scan, but they are things that are going to present in the symptoms and the signs that you are having. Again, this is the hardest thing to grasp when you are at odds of how you feel And how a specialist sees you. Again, this isn't to say that imaging doesn't have its purpose. Now, if you were to have a substantial TBI, you're in a car accident, or heaven forbid, you were assaulted to the point where you could have a fracture in your skull or brain bleeds, that is when you really need to get those scans, okay, to determine those life-threatening, potentially life-threatening issues. But a concussion is not going to present on an MRI or a CT scan, any kind of scan that you're going to get when you go to the hospital, when you go to a specialist. So, what I was left with feeling was that these symptoms were all in my head. Now, the problem with a lot of physicians and specialists in medicine is that they can be behind the science, sometimes 10 to 15 years behind what the science is telling us. Telling us. Now, we know the science is telling us that concussions don't show up on scans, and that by taking these scans, we're not really providing much evidence of your state. What you need is you need symptomology to determine if you have a concussion, if you still have a concussion and have post-concussion syndrome. Now, if your doctor doesn't understand this, this is going to create frustration. This is going to create angst in the system. And that feeling that, is there really something wrong with me? Is it just me? Is it all in my head? I had those thoughts over and over in a sick loop that turned into a subconscious loop that I would think about all the time. Anytime I had a symptom, I would, is it just me? Is this really a problem? Do I really just have anxiety? Do I really just have apprehension? And at one point, my doctor, Um, tried to prescribe me for some anxiety medication, and I told him I'm not ready for that. I mean, I could have, I could have just taken it. It would have helped with the symptoms, but it wouldn't fix the underlying problems. Now, that is what I want to talk about. That is the hope of this channel. So if you've been watching any of my other videos, you know that my main goal is to fix the underlying causes, fix the foundational issues, the cracks in the foundation, Using lifestyle modifications. So if I were to go ahead and take that medication from the doctor, it would help in the moment, it might help for a while, but I would be stuck on that medication for a lifetime until I fixed those issues. For me, it was the irregularity of blood flow, it was the autonomic nervous system, it was my hormones. Until I fixed those, my problems would persist, and they would persist in perpetuity, and I would be stuck. Is someone on medication for a problem that I had the power to fix? Okay, this all comes back to the concept that what you hear from a physician, from a specialist, doesn't mean that is actually the truth, doesn't mean that that is actually how you present. So be careful when you're hearing things. You go to a neurologist and they say, nothing is presenting on these scans, I cannot do much more for you. I'm sorry. Don't take that as this is something in your head, this is something that we cannot fix, you're going to have to live with, because you don't. There are things that you can do, many things that you can do to kickstart that recovery. Now, the longer these symptoms have been presenting, have been present in your system, the longer it's going to take to fix the issues. Hey, but Here's what I want to present to you: that those issues can be kickstarted by things that you can do. Now, the thing I learned that was the most powerful part, the revelation of my recovery, was that I had a say in my recovery. I was the change agent. I was the one that was going to initiate those lifestyle changes. I was going to change my mindset. I was going to try to work on small wins that would increase my belief Which would create momentum and motivation to do more things. But I could do that. And what that said was that I'm not here to oppose the medical model. I'm not here to say that all doctors are ignorant to the concept of concussions. But what I am here to say is that when I found the power in myself to change my state, it changed my life, not only for my recovery, but for any and every other aspect of my life. I learned that at the end of the day, the person who is most responsible, who is most passionate for my recovery, is me. And therefore, I had to take the onus. I had to take the initiative to go ahead and start. And it wasn't on someone else who had 30 other patients, 50 other patients to see. They were not going to have that same impetus, that same passion and desire that I would have. This is my life, and I was going to become an active participant in my recovery. Okay, here's what I want you to do today. Again, you've done those scans, they've come back clean, they've come back normal, and you're sitting there wondering, okay, what's next? My doctor thinks it's all in my head. This neurologist told me there's nothing wrong with me. What do I do next? Okay, here's what you do. You start small, but you start by doing something today that is going to start changing your identity, start changing your own perception of who you are as a person. Right now, your perception is likely someone who's struggling with post-concussion syndrome. And because you have that identity of yourself, that is a rut that you're stuck in because it's keeping you down. It's a glass ceiling that's disallowing you from moving on, from advancing yourself. So the first thing you're going to do is do something small. Add 5 minutes of breathwork in the morning. Do one point of gratitude. Do something. Most people, when they're in this state of recovery, they're not information poor, they're implementation poor. We don't know where to start, where to begin. I'm going to give it to you right now. Start small. Start one thing. Next week, add a second thing. The third week, add a third. What you're doing is you're changing your identity. You're changing your perception of who you are as a person. You're now someone who is actively involved in your recovery. You're no longer waiting for a scan to tell you you're broken. You are now going to say, I have the power to change my body. I believe in neuroplasticity. I believe in myself to change my state so that I can be the person I want to be. Start small, but start today. I believe in you because I was in that same state twice. I suffered from post-concussion syndrome on two separate occasions, came back both times, and I feel better today than I did prior to that first one. It takes time, but it takes you understanding that you are the one involved. You are the one who needs to take that first step. Okay, I appreciate you. If this Information is landing with you. Down below is a link to a waitlist for my PCS Resilience Collective, which is a group that I'm going to start shortly, where our main goal is for me to act as the guide and you to act as the hero in your own story. I'm going to take you from where you are to where you want to be. I will show you the way. I'll walk you the path. I've been there before. I've been there twice before, and I want to help you get to where you know you can be. I hope you have yourself a great day. Thank you for listening.
