Mr. Woodruff:

Hello my name is Chris Branscum, I am writing this in hopes that some one would read this and in turn receive a little comfort knowing that the the difficulties that one faces are not a solo journey.

When I was six years old I was hit by a car and suffered damage to the whole left hemisphere of my my brain along with receiving lacerations to the brain stem. damage that would have surely killed my on any normal day. I was told that my future was bleak and that my accomplishments would be few are far between.

When I awoke from the coma that I was in It was as if I had reverberated back to an infancy stage, I had to learn how to crawl, sit up and eventually walk and talk and to feed myself.

 I unfortunately had no memory of what had happened to me, growing up I endured many trials and tribulations while in the second grade. No it wasn't the learning which in itself was difficult but that my fellow class mates had labeled me as a mentally #### boy due in part to my slow response time and my lack of balance, this was a perspective that was shared not only by the student body but also by the teachers. It would be years before the realization of what had happened to me would be assimilated in to my memory.

here I sit before this monitor twenty-one years later having graduated from High School in 1998, and just recently graduating from a Junior College with my transferable AA so that I can pursue a degree in Neuropsychology so that I might be capable of aiding those who have and will suffer from Traumatic Brain Injuries, My wish is to be able to help a child/adult who has suffered a TBI to come to terms with how their accident has and will impact their lives and to help them to learn how to overcome the obstacles that will emerge in their way.

I thank You Mr. and Mrs Woodruff for the actions that you have taken to bring this injury to the publics and the governments eyes.