Surviving Traumatic Brain Injury

On The Air

The Show That Wasn’t!

The Show That Was!

The Show That Will Be!

presented

by

Donna O’Donnell Figurski

Brain Injury Radio “Another Fork in the Road”

NFL Player, Kyle Turley, Brain Injury & Football

(The show that didn’t happen.)

Every once in a while, BlogTalkRadio throws a wrench into the “best laid plans.” They did it last night.

I’d spent all week preparing my interview with football player and musician, Kyle Turley. Emails flew back and forth through cyberspace finessing each last detail. I arrived in the studio fourteen minutes before the show, as I always do, and I waited for Kyle. My guests always arrive early too, but when Kyle didn’t arrive at the designated time, I knew something was wrong. I texted him. He said that he had already called in to the studio twice and was put on hold both times. He said he wasn’t able to access a line to the studio.

The show-countdown began, “5, 4, 3, 2, 1 – You are ON THE AIR.” My pre-recorded musical show-identification played. I love it. It always relaxes me before a show, but its magic didn’t work last night as I crossed my fingers and hoped that Kyle would be able to get into the show in time. Its magic didn’t work as my mind raced to find a creative way to get him in. I had my doubts about my success because there were other things in the studio that weren’t operating properly either. The countdown clock was dark, and the chat room refused to open, yet I was still on the air. I had to talk, so I began my show introduction, which I had planned to cut short because my interview with Kyle was jam-packed and I didn’t want to lose a single second.

While I am usually pretty good at multitasking, it’s just darn hard to talk on the radio with poise while attempting to text and solve problems over the phone. The brain just doesn’t want to work that way. At least mine was balking at those tasks. Surprisingly, I figured out an innovative way to get Kyle into the studio, though unfortunately his voice sounded distant and not really suitable for the radio connections. And, we had already lost twenty minutes of show-time. So it was big-decision time, and Kyle made the decision for me. He said, “Let’s reschedule, so we can do this right.” And I agreed. I promised to contact him and set up a new date, though it will mean juggling some already-scheduled shows.

(The show that unexpectedly happened.)

With that decision made, I realized I had another big one to make. What was I going to talk about on the radio for the remaining “unprepared” hour? I couldn’t use my planned program with Kyle. That was impossible. So, with some more quick thinking, I decided to talk about this blog. I would explain the function and the categories of my blog. SurvivingTraumaticBrainInjury.com is a service blog. I write it to impart information to the brain-injured community. I discussed each category on the blog, explained its purpose, and told people how they can best get the most out of the information on the blog. I also provided anecdotal comments about each category on the blog and how each category evolved.

I was surprised to find that the hour flew by. Soon I was looking at almost 7:00 pm Pacific time, and it was time to wrap up the show. And it’s also time to wrap up this explanation of “the show that ALMOST wasn’t.”

I offer my sincere apologies to Kyle Turley for the glitch in our program last night and my sincere appreciation for his understanding and for his graciousness in agreeing to reschedule the show at a date in the near future. He is a pretty remarkable and talented man.

(The show that would have been and will be someday soon.)

Kyle Turley, former football player for the New Orleans Saints, the Saint Louis Rams, and the Kansas City Chiefs, will join me to discuss life after football while living with brain injury. As an offensive tackle, Kyle has had more than his share of concussions – leading to seizures and various brain-injury complications, which have adversely affected his life. Kyle is picking up the pieces and assembling his life-puzzle by speaking out about brain injury. He does this through his music, (video 1, video 2) The Kyle Turley Band, and his recent documentary, “The United States of Football.”

See you “On the Air!”

(Clip Art compliments of Bing.)

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