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Brain Training Helps 81-Year-Old in Early Stages of Alzheimer’s

Apr 4

Posted by LearningRx in Brain Training, Memory | No Comments

When my doctor told me I was in the early stages of Alzheimer’s, I was devastated.

Not wanting to become a burden to my children, I sold my house, moved to an assisted living center, and waited for Alzheimer’s to finish robbing me of whatever quality of life I had left.

I’d been talking slower and getting confused. I couldn’t even remember my address! But the greatest loss of all had been reading. Before, I’d enjoyed reading books, magazines and my Bible every single day. Now, I could read a paragraph over and over and not understand or remember anything I’d read!

I began to sink into depression. 

That December, someone gave me a book about the brain’s ability to create new neurons at any age. The book mentioned a company—LearningRx—that pairs you up with a brain trainer who takes you through special mental exercises, stimulating your brain to reorganize existing neurons and even create new ones.

I got on the phone and called the LearningRx Brain Training Center in Bossier City, Louisiana where I live.

Could brain training help me? I’d soon know.

The first time I met Maria, my brain trainer, she immediately announced, “Now Virginia, you may be 81 years old, but you can do this, and I’m not cutting you any slack!”

Right away, she had me memorize the names of all the presidents of the United States by linking crazy images to each of their names. The next time my daughter Kenda and son-in-law Randy came to visit, I rattled off the names of all 44 presidents.

Kenda said, “Mom, I can’t even do that!”

Before long there were books and magazines all over my apartment again. I even started playing cards with my friends again.

Randy told me, “I love seeing your zest for life coming back!”

Thinking, reading, talking—even making decisions—got faster and easier. My neurologist tested my brain function and said it had jumped from 77.1 to 95.9!

At my LearningRx graduation Randy told everyone, “We have our wonderful Virginia back.”

I love being able to do the things I enjoy. Best yet, I know I’m not at the end of my life. I may be 81, but I’m not giving up. I still have a future to look forward to.

 

Watch Virginia’s Video

 

Photo credit: Cristie Magnusson

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Overcoming the Impact of Concussions Caused by School Sports

Mar 28

Posted by LearningRx in Brain Health, Brain Training, LearningRx Videos, Memory | No Comments

 Sometimes David got to the locker room and  couldn’t remember the football game he’d just played.

In junior high, David had been a straight A student. But after a concussion, he began struggling in school, and additional concussions while playing football in high school only made things worse.

Years later, married and with a baby on the way, David graduated from a police academy. But repeatedly his applications for jobs were rejected because his test scores were too low.  After applying to 56 police departments—without a single job offer—David called LearningRx.

He calls what happened next “an awakening” of his brain.

“Shortly after starting brain training, I remembered a dream I’d had the night before,” David says. “That hadn’t happened since… well, since I was a kid! After that, improvements just kept coming.”

One day, driving on a familiar tree-lined street David realized that, in his peripheral vision, he could see houses past the trees. For years, his field of vision had only included the street and the trees. Brain training was even improving his vision!

Things were different at home, too. Now when his wife, Lorelle, asked him to get something from the store, he remembered! But the changes went even deeper. One night David asked his wife, “Do you think brain training has made a difference?” Her answer surprised him.

“I feel closer to you,” she said. “We have more intimate conversations now. I feel like you really hear me.”

David realized it was true. “After brain training,” he says, “I could follow my wife better during conversations, and remember things we talked about. What a difference that made in our relationship!”

After 12 weeks of brain training, David got a call from a department that had rejected his application seven months earlier. They said they had another job opening and asked if David wanted to reapply. That same week, Lorelle gave birth to a baby girl. It seemed the week for new beginnings.

This time, David passed all the exams and landed his dream job.

David had no idea his career was being hindered by those long-ago concussions. “Brain training changed my quality of life in every area of my life,” he says today. “Now I really can dream again.”

Watch David’s Video

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Ten-Year-Old Gymnast Wins National President’s Day Contest

Feb 20

Posted by LearningRx in A Mom's Journal, Attention Skills, Brain Training, Cognitive skills, Confidence, LearningRx Videos, Memory | No Comments

Ten-year-old Taylor Peterson didn’t want to compete in gymnastics this year. She started gymnastics when she was three, and loved it, but after seven years it was time to start competing, and she just didn’t have the confidence to continue.

“It was so hard,” says her mom Kim Peterson. “You have this little girl that you know is awesome, but she doesn’t know it. She couldn’t see what we could see – all that potential and just how good she really was. She just said she felt horrible and didn’t want to compete.”

Then Taylor started a personalized, one-on-one brain training program at LearningRx to help with her school work. Taylor had always worked incredibly hard in school, yet she always struggled too, even with extra help.

“Her teachers always just told me to be patient – that it would click,” says Kim. “They would tell me that she was the hardest worker in the class, and that eventually she’ll get it because she’s a really smart kid.” But when it still hadn’t clicked by fourth grade, Taylor’s teacher warned the Petersons that they needed to find the problem and fix it soon to avoid a future of escalating struggles and learning problems.

Cognitive skills testing found the problem and confirmed the Petersons’ suspicion that Taylor had never developed the phonemic awareness skills necessary to be a strong reader. Brain training at LearningRx changed all that. Homework is now easier and faster, Taylor’s getting better grades, and for the first time ever she’s performing at grade level.

“LearningRx brain training helped me so much,” says Taylor. “I used to study spelling words so much every single night, and now I just study one night and get good grades. I like school more now that it’s easier.”

At the end of training, testing confirmed impressive improvements in Taylor’s cognitive skills, equating to a general IQ increase of 18 points. But the Petersons didn’t need the test results to confirm the improvements. They noticed the first big change within weeks of starting the program when Taylor’s confidence soared and she came to her Mom and said, “I’m ready to compete!”

Taylors’ newly strengthened attention skills gave her such intense focus under pressure that other moms marveled at it. Her stronger memory skills helped her quickly remember new routines during one practice instead of writing them down and reviewing dozens of times at home. And at the end of the season, Taylor claimed the top spot on the podium – first place at state in the all-around for level four gymnastics.

“It’s so emotional,” says Kim. “She’s there because of LearningRx. You changed her little life. I fear that she would’ve turned into a lost little soul, and now she’s so confident and excelling in so many different areas. It’s such a relief that she’s not struggling in school anymore. It’s just been awesome.”

Taylor demonstrates her improved attention and memory skills and her champion-level gymnastics talent in this winning video for the annual LearningRx President’s Day Video Contest. Taylor recites all 44 U.S. presidents, forward and backward, in the 31-second clip and won an iPad, and another title, for the effort.

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Better Memory

Jan 12

Posted by LearningRx in Brain Health, Memory | 1 Comment

Your memory is powered by core brain skills, also known as cognitive skills. But your brain isn’t exactly the Lone Ranger. It can’t function by itself (or even with a single trusted friend named Tonto). Instead, your brain depends on myriad systems in your body (and the health of those systems) in order to do its best work.

To keep your body, your brain (and your memory) riding strong, here are three things you should do (and three things you should avoid):

1. Do treat depression. Everybody feels blue now and then, and these feelings usually mosey on out of our lives by themselves. Ongoing depression, however, is another matter and can lead to numerous health risks and problems. For example, long-term depression elevates levels of cortisol in the brain. This can shrink the hippocampus, the part of the brain responsible for short term memory. One study showed that people who had been depressed–even if it was years ago–had smaller hippocampuses by as much as 15%. Because the hippocampus helps process short term memories, long-term depression can impair the ability to hang onto new information. If you have been depressed or sad for more than six weeks, get help. See a doctor or mental health professional.

2. Do exercise your body. Your brain needs a constant supply of oxygen and nutrients. Exercise not only increases blood flow temporarily, it also helps keep your heart and arteries healthy so that even when you’re not exercising, blood flow to the brain stays strong. Even more fascinating, studies show that regular aerobic exercise actually grows new brain cells in the hippocampus (yes, the memory-processing part of your brain that long-term depression can shrink). Extra good news: Exercise is a recognized treatment for depression, too! In one study by the National Academy of Sciences, a three-month program of vigorous aerobic exercise produced a 30 percent increase in hippocampus brain cells! Read the rest of this entry »

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Memory and the Brain

Jan 7

Posted by LearningRx in Brain Health, Memory | 1 Comment

With Thanksgiving and Christmas behind us, you probably had the chance to hang out with friends and family, creating warm, festive memories.

Now all you have to do is remember them.

As we age, memory can weaken. The good news is that memory skills are not “fixed.” You can improve and strengthen your ability to remember important events and details in your life. This is because of something called neuroplasticity, which refers to the brain’s life-long ability to reorganize, strengthen, and even create brand new connections that allow us to store and retrieve information, including memories!

Here are three ways to protect and even improve your ability to remember the important events and details in your life:

1. Practice the 8-second rule. Sometimes we can’t remember something because we never focused on it long enough to get the information into our memory banks to begin with. By practicing and strengthening your attention skills, your brain will have what it needs to retrieve the information later. A good rule of thumb is to focus for a minimum of eight seconds on whatever it is you want to remember later. Read the rest of this entry »

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