Cognitive Rehabilitation Patient Views

I went to speech/cognitive therapy in the early months of my long Covid. I don’t recall a ton about it but I did find it fairly helpful, mostly teaching or reminding me of things I could do to lighten the cognitive load and to take cognitive breaks

I did speech therapy early on for cognitive issues. I was given some exercises and tips to help me with memory and my new issues with over stimulation/ slower processing speed, etc.. (long covid). It’s not a cure all but it does help some. I found it worthwhile

I’ve been to a speech therapist twice (once for LC brain fog/aphasia and once for vocal training after straining my vocal cords from coughing). The patient actually found it incredibly useful. She taught the patient a trick for how to deal with aphasia (tap your knee to distract the brain), the occasional stammer (elongate first syllable of a word - doesn’t work for everyone), then speaking exercises to try to get my voice normal again. She taught the patient how to do basic sudoku puzzles to challenge, but not overtax, the brain.

It’s not a cure-all, but if you get a speech therapist who is willing to listen and learn about your symptoms, it’s a pretty good investment.

I can speak from experience, as I have done a brain retaining program, as recommended by my specialist. While it was no cure, it did really help my mindset and coping. This is in tandem with medications, nervous system regulation, and pacing. For me, it was one pillar in many that moved me from 5% to 25%.

I was sent to a speech-language pathologist for Cognitive Rehabilitation Therapy but I was already using all the coping strategies she was planning to teach me. :/ so instead she helped me with cognitively difficult tasks like paperwork and calling bureaucracy and such.

I was like that, too. Ask your doctor about speech language therapy. It's literally PT for your brain. The stuff that helps stroke patients helps with long covid brain fog! I did 12 weeks and got like 90% back of pre covid cognitive abilities.

I did months of weekly cognitive and speech therapy, and largely it was unhelpful. The exercises didn’t help improve my cognitive functioning or speech problems. I was told to write things down (which I already did) and learned about pacing (which I had not been doing well). I was told I had the best therapist in the place but she was taking notes from me on what I was already doing to share with other patients. Understanding the need to listen to my body and anticipate better was helpful, and being told the “brain fog” was cognitive dysfunction and treated the same as TBI was validating, but the actual retraining was so useless I cancelled my last couple sessions. Travel to the facility was cumbersome and insurance wouldn’t cover telehealth. Others results may vary.

I had a similar recovery (mostly) story to yours. Recognized that it was my brain that really took the hit. The rest of my body did its thing to heal everything else, but my brain desperately needed to be retrained from the ground up. Some days are more difficult than others, but ever since I recognized that my brain was the issue I started to gradually get better. I'm different now because of it, but I believe it changed me for the better honestly.

I’m finally in a LC ME/CFS clinic with specialist docs and they’re talking about brain retraining. Too early for me to weigh in, but the fact that it’s part of a recovery protocol says something.

I bet there is neuroplasticity in our adaptive skills, and I truly think the amazing thing is how functional so many of us are, even when we're not functional, if you know what I mean. I tried neuro-feedback and would like to go back to it: it made me feel fantastic the day after, but then I'd crash for 3 or 4 days. After trying it a couple of times I found I had to move and quit, since I couldn't afford the crashes (and not being able to afford the cash was a factor, too). But I want to try again, and I'd be interested to hear the details from anyone who has tried it. I'll also note that I was a confirmed ginkgo user before CFS, but I don't appear to absorb it well now (i.e. I don't get the sharp-brain effects which used to always follow popping a ginkgo pill). I have tried vinpocetine (an extract of periwinkle, or vinca), and it does seem to clear the mists, sometimes just a bit and others quite a lot. As with most of these supplements, it takes an hour or so to kick in, then lasts for three or four hours. Worth trying, as it isn't very expensive.