I’m a survivor of an acquired brain injury. My seizures changed my life. I’m also a daughter, a retired military wife, a mother, a registered nurse, and an advocate for persons with disabilities. I’m a caregiver who has now experienced life on both sides of the fence for brain injury.
I understand now what I had only observed before about what it means to live with a brain injury. There is the anger, fear, frustration, and uncertainty that come with a sudden illness or disability. There is that sudden loss of independence, the onset of financial difficulties due to job loss, and the depression that accompany them both. Brain injury changed my life in many ways.

As a TBI survivor, Kimberly Carnevale knows what it means to need assistance and accommodations for physical and cognitive impairments. As a trainer of service dogs, she trains business about the rights of people with disabilities and handicaps for accommodations. Recently, she’s gained a new and unexpected clientele – business owners who believe that their establishment had been visited by (and in many cases, damaged by) “imposter” service dogs. This is the canine version of illegally parking in a handicapped parking space.

Traumatic brain injury can be invisible to casual observers. Just because a person doesn’t show outward signs of disability, it doesn’t mean that the person doesn’t have challenges. After my brain injury, my life went on overload. I look okay but my appearance hides the internal storm that rages inside my injured brain. I struggle through the day trying to get my daughter out the door to preschool and doing the day to day tasks of finding my purse, paying the bills, doing the shopping.

A traumatic brain injury forces Kimberly Carnevale to reevaluate what’s important in life as a survivor. Coping with the trauma of her brain injury, grieving her losses, losing her home – losing everything leads her to a new beginning as she rebuilds her life. Her daughter and her service dog become the priorities in her life as she clears her mind, builds a new path, and creates a new vision for living a full life as a survivor.