City: Sanford

Brain Injury: Closed head injury and post concussive syndrome due to a propelled accident off of my horse in 2006.

Explanation of Mask: My mask portrays the dark grey, black and blue matter that occurred with accident. The brain injury created dark shades of my life being lost. I lost my job, my horse, horseback riding would be no more. I lost the ability to play my flute and the friends that went along with those activities in my previous life. I lost my peripheral vision making driving limited to daytime within 10 miles of my house on a good day. The red tear is for gratefulness, the green drops are the hopes I create. My mouth is closed because I often feel underheard especially by medical and disability systems. Out of this injury I have learned to create art and write about the experiences of loss and how hope lives within these happenings. My book, “Reinventing Oneself After Loss, An Artful Insight”, are represented with the orange spots of coming back to life with purpose and hope.