HOW DID B.R.A.I.N BEGIN?

In 2006, our family discovered the reality of our own daughter’s brain challenge and we realize that challenge continues to impact us to this very day. After being told that Kristin was schizophrenic and needed long term mental health care, we began a journey to find how who and what would be helpful to our daughter. We were shocked to find the resources to be scarce and the living facilities available to our daughter were way less than adequate.

Our experience within the county mental health system often made us wonder who the patient was. We went through conservatorships, dual diagnosis facilities, psychologists, psychiatrists, truck loads of paper work and were given no real answers to our need for true caring help for Kristin. We desperately knocked on doors, called phone numbers, emailed organizations for help. We learned that there are a lot of people with salaries and names on doors in the mental health field whose sole purpose is to tell families that there is no real help available to them for their brain injured loved one.

In the middle of trying to find assistance, we were encouraged to get a brain scan to be able to accurately diagnose our daughter’s disability. The scan showed brain trauma to Kristin’s frontal lobes, which made all kinds of sense to us as we thought back on her 31 years of life. I was given an overdose of pitocin and had a rushed forceps delivery. The brain injury diagnosis made no difference in getting adequate care and housing for Kristin. She has been in at least 12 different housing facilities since her disability was diagnosed in 2001. I know we can do better to care for those with brain injuries.

Knowing the urgency of having adequate care for our daughter in the future gave us the motivation to begin B.R.A.I.N. We are an organization where families can gain insight, information as well as investment return when they donate to the brain injury cause. We want to create a home atmosphere facility for those who have sustained a brain injury. We believe that those with brain injuries deserve a lifestyle that is full of purpose, grace, and dignity. We believe that there is much to learn and much to be grateful for as a family moves forward with a brain-injured loved-one. B.R.A.I.N. exists to give those with brain injuries hope for the future.

Sincerely,
Sue and Jerry Rueb, Founders of B.R.A.I.N.