That looks like an expensive stack. I don't see any anti-oxidants.

I have not seen Len Ochs suggest anything about updating his system. Nor does he post any true research. He continues to promote LENS in violation of FDA statutes. He does not collect and report any negative outcomes. Instead, he claims there have not been any and gets past FDA rules by claiming GRAS (Generally Regarded As Safe)when there is evidence to the contrary. He promotes it for more than it is allowed. It is allowed to be promoted as a relaxation device, not a healing or treating device.

He or one of his people tried to post on NT but stopped when we asked questions he was not willing or able to answer.

I'm all for alternative treatments but am very concerned when there is a lack of openness and response to concerns and when there are attempts to skirt the laws and regulations.

Here is the description of the LENS FDA registration no. 3007608780,

Subpart F--Neurological Therapeutic Devices
Sec. 882.5050 Biofeedback device.

(a) Identification. A biofeedback device is an instrument that provides a visual or auditory signal corresponding to the status of one or more of a patient's physiological parameters (e.g., brain alpha wave activity, muscle activity, skin temperature, etc.) so that the patient can control voluntarily these physiological parameters.

(b) Classification. Class II (special controls). The device is exempt from the premarket notification procedures in subpart E of part 807 of this chapter when it is a prescription battery powered device that is indicated for relaxation training and muscle reeducation and prescription use, subject to 882.9.

The device is registered as a volitional (voluntary effort) device but with the LENS system, the patient is passive and the LENS system pushes electromagnetic waves to the brain.

OchsLabs gets away with this partially by leaving the promotion to the practitioner. Ochs just suggests areas it can help and holds training sessions for practitioners. The FDA does not regulate how the practitioners promote a device.

So, lots of gray area use. It leaves me skeptical.

Hi BirdOntheWire,

Thanks for sharing your experience...it is eery how closely it aligns with mine. It is tremendously helpful to hear of similar experiences, particularly when the existing literature is too scant and dependent upon animal studies to have made its way into most neurologists/psychiatrists' offices. I do have a few questions, if you don't mind..

First, you mention that in the period right after your concussion, you were able to continue mostly as normal? I am curious as to the extent of your original injury prior to the temazepam usage, because you said you "didn't notice any major changes right after the injury." From what you say, it sounds like things went progressively downhill -- dramatically -- and quickly after a few weeks of the temazepam usage. How would you say you are doing now? Did any of the general confusion, difficulty with reading and comprehension and memory problems lift once you got out of the awful benzo withdrawal? I know I was only on the benzos for two months (and, like you, drinking during some of that time), but I wonder if some of what I"m feeling is withdrawal, though, as I'm two months free of benzos now, likely not.

Secondly, how are you doing now? I'm so sorry to hear that these symptoms have been plaguing you for a decade now, even after the benzo withdrawal. Were there any stages at which you felt improvement or have things remained mostly stagnant beyond the intervention from visual therapy and some neurofeedback? What happened to you after your sophomore year of college?

I would love to hear more about the supplements you are taking/any other details of your story/advice you feel like sharing. I started Mark's regimen of B12 and curcumin with some D and E vitamins about a week ago, but am open to additional recommendations. Also somewhat curious (though I know that each injury is different) as to how things have unfolded for you. What sorts of doctors have you seen? Have you had any concrete diagnosis that might help you access resources for rehabilitation or disability? How has your family/friends responded?

I am hoping that you are feeling somewhat better...I feel for you tremendously and hope that your decade of suffering will soon be somewhat alleviated.

Mark,

The stack can get a bit expensive, though mainly just due to the sheer number of supplements I take. The only one that really breaks the bank is the PQQ, which I’m trying for the first time and I don’t know if I notice enough of a difference to justify the price. Almost all of the other pills were recommended to me by my doctors. I take the quercetin for its antioxidant properties – I take vitamin C sporadically as well but it tends to irritate my stomach.

I know there have been different versions of the LENS device rolled out, since I’ve had practitioners with different versions, but I don’t know if any meaningful changes to the software itself were involved. I wasn’t aware of their questionable business practices; I discovered it from reading others on the internet claiming it helped with their PCS. It sounds like I was lucky, because it really was quite helpful for me – not only did it take the PCS symptoms down significantly, it also brought down my anxiety to normal levels for the first time since I CTed off the benzos 7 years before that, and pretty much cured my lifelong insomnia (an effect that’s remained, at least so far). But I don’t personally know anyone else who’s tried LENS, so for all I know my results were quite out of the ordinary.

Either way, thanks for informing me of its downsides, I might still recommend it to those in a similar situation to me but now I’ll be sure to include fair warning and let them decide if they want to take the risk. In the end I’ve found NeurOptimal to be more helpful; hopefully that one has fewer negative aspects, though again I can only say how it’s affected me personally.

GG,

It really is eerie. It’s been a mystery to me all these years what exactly happened, and why I continued to get so much worse for almost a year after the injury. I’ve accepted that at this point there’s no way to know, but I’ve suspected the benzos and alcohol were the main culprit. The similarity of our experiences is quite interesting in that sense.

I’ve always struggled to remember my state of mind after the injury and figure out just how much the injury itself affected me. All I can say for sure is that by the time I started school two weeks later I noticed immediately that I was having reading comprehension problems, which I had never experienced before in my life. And the facts that I didn’t even think to suspect the brain injury and that I was completely unconcerned about my declining mental state suggest to me that I was already pretty out of it. I made it through the latter 3 years of college only thanks to Adderall, which I’m sure also did me no favors in the long run.

The injury itself was fairly significant – I lost consciousness for a while, then was catatonic and then behaving irrationally and erratically, and have 5 or 6 hours of lost time, so I can’t imagine it didn’t affect me more than I thought at the time. I went to work the next day and took a half day because I was having vertigo, took the weekend off, and then went back to work and thought no more of it. But my memory of the time period after the injury is much hazier than that of the time before it, which leads me to believe that some noticeable damage had already been done.

I’m doing worlds better now, but it’s been quite the process. My brain still gets easily overstimulated, but as I recover I’m able to handle more and more without shutting down. My condition has also been complicated by PCS from a second injury 3 years ago, but the long-term repercussions of that one have been attributed to my neck more than my brain. I would say that ever since hitting rock bottom in the months after quitting the benzos, I’ve improved steadily but very slowly. It’s been difficult to parse out what issues were due to benzo withdrawal and what was due to the damage already done. My cognitive problems were already so bad that I only noticed them getting a little worse when I stopped the benzos; my main withdrawal symptom was my anxiety and stress levels skyrocketing.

As such, it’s also hard to say when the benzo withdrawal ended, because all of the issues got slightly better over time but none of them went away on their own. Only active interventions like the vision therapy and neurofeedback have made a meaningful difference for me. It seems not impossible that some of your issues could be due to withdrawal at this point, though it’s so hard to know since benzo withdrawal and brain injuries have so many common symptoms. Did you notice any change when you went off the Valium and Xanax? You’re lucky that you realized what was happening before further damage was done or you became dependent on them.

My concussion doctor for my more recent injury had recommended resveratrol and green tea extract in addition to curcumin for TBI recovery; I’ve tried all of them and dozens of other supplements, and I personally didn’t notice a drastic difference with any of them. But eating a nutrient-dense diet and taking many various brain-supporting supplements seems to have helped a lot overall.

I hope you’re continuing to see improvement. You seem like you’re in a much better position to recover than I was. It took me years and years to even figure out what had happened to me, to find medical professionals who knew anything at all about brain injuries, and to stop doing further damage. I’m happy to provide any moral support I can – I know how hard it can be to find others who can relate. Take good care of yourself!

BirdOntheWire,

Thanks for the reply. Strange as it may sound, merely finding that others have experienced the same thing -- I think of it as a double injury, the brain injury plus the benzos -- is itself quite a bit of moral support. You're right that it's impossible to disentangle all of the relevant factors and determine precisely the extent of the benzo-induced damage. Nonetheless I feel essentially certain that at least in my case the benzos wreaked the most devastating havoc, given the progression of symptoms. I think it's just hard to believe that something which is so frequently used by healthy individuals could cause so much damage in a vulnerable brain.

There is another user who has since left the site who complained of something similar -- his/her username is Lacrossefan and their drug of poison was Ativan.

On a practical note, which were the brain supportive supplements which you found helpful? And, in terms of timeline, how long after you stopped the benzo did you begin to feel even marginal improvement? I realize I am getting into possibly futile territory here as no two injuries are alike, and furthermore, mine was hypoxic so highly diffuse in nature and seems to have affected my cognitive abilities most. That being said, I'm dipping my toe into that pool of comparison because I'm beginning to wonder if my injury has any hope of healing.

I actually have seen zero improvement...since things got worse with the benzos four months ago, I haven't found any lightening of the brain fog and inability to process. Words always escape me when trying to express what the fog is, but it's much more than being dazed. It's more like being high and having a terrible flu, with a good dose of actual inability to comprehend spoken, written, or visual information. I am astounded (and impressed) that you were able to complete university on stimulants. I have found myself unable to read even children's books for full comprehension. These neurotalk posts I find only halfway intelligible...like I'm receiving a mild impression, water on a page, so to speak, if any of that sounds familiar? It's not just being out of it, but "hard" or "technical" cognitive dysfunctions. I suppose I'm wondering if your cognitive impairment ever reached these depths?

I'm very glad to hear that you're feeling better and that you've found therapies which have targeted your visual issues. I don't know what your cognitive status is now, but I must say you write with extraordinary clarity!

Many thanks for your support.

As someone who is now addicted to Lorazapem, and struggling to taper off while experiencing PCS symptoms, I can say that daily benzo use definitely slows down recovery from a concussion and is likely causing harm that I'm not yet aware of. I was prescribed Ativan for sleep/insomnia issues immediately post concussion and took only 12 doses and was hooked. I realized this 3+ months ago and am still struggling to taper down my dose. Had I known about how addictive this drug is, I would never have taken 1 pill. I only wish I had found this board earlier.

Hi NW Guy,

I'm sorry to hear of your struggles. I wish I had more positive information to share, but I think we are all becoming aware of the undeniable fact that benzodiazepines are extremely dangerous for those with brain injury. If the studies I posted before (Long-term impairment of behavioral recovery from cortical damage can be produced by short-term GABA-agonist infusion into adjacent cortex. - PubMed - NCBI) () (https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/3742206 weren't enough, I have spoken with the lead researcher of those studies and explained my development of symptoms (cognitive impairment and visual coordination issues significantly worsening after taking Valium and Xanax). His response was that his research supported/explained everything that had happened, and that taking benzodiazepines after brain injury "doomed" recovery in the animals he had treated.