MovieChat Forums > The Vow (2012) Discussion > Brain damage CAN alter a person's person...

Brain damage CAN alter a person's personality drastically...

posted 12 years ago by al666940-3
13 replies | jump to latest

To everyone ehre who's complaining about McAdams being so difficult to deal with after her accident, you need to realize something:

Head injuries that result in brain damage CAN alter someone's personality. Such injuries NEVER fully recover, and some damage is never healed. And if the brain areas that deal with behavior and personality were compromised, then that person will NEVER be the same, even if the memory IS intact.

So it's not that much of a strech to see an apparently sweet and easygoing person turn into a difficult immature thin skinned b!tch.

I mean, take into consideration:
1- About good 5 years of her life were erased, meaning:
a) She's lost whatever skills she learned, so good bye current job.
b) Recent friends and mates now are strangers, so good bye recent relationships.
c) Like coming out of jail, everyone has moved on but you.
2.- She's not and will never fully recover, so there' some disability to stay with her.
3.- It seems her personality was compromised due to the brain damage. So forget about who she WAS, that person is forever gone.

Wouldn't you be also upset and resentful in her shoes? Being forced to relate to perfect strangers whom you LIKED yet are not sure you like NOW anymore, and trying to pierce together what's left of your life?

I'm surprised she wasn't even harder to deal with.

[–] Lola_Xtar 12 years ago

Even without brain damage, I was in a pretty bad car accident last year luckily nothing happened to the outside of my body but it definitely changed me things I didn't even notice until I started seeing a psychologist. It's really a remarkable yet scary thing.

[–] tjones8271 12 years ago

I used to be an a-hole sometimes as a child and my father would knock the t-total $#!t out of me. It changed my personality real quick.

The eyes are the nipples of the face

[–] al666940-3 12 years ago

" my father would knock the t-total $#!t out of me. It changed my personality real quick. "

It changed your ATTITUDE, and provided some really useful self control skills.

[–] raf-33 12 years ago

I was the recipient of the first entire brain transplant, I used to like spaghetti but now I hate it! Though to be fair it was probably really the first brain that liked spaghetti.

I think you know what I'm gettin' at Mr. President. We're gonna kill us a mummy.

[–] oggologgo 12 years ago

All you teach your kid by beating them, is for them to beat their own kids too.

No kid needs violence, to learn how to behave.

[–] brupey-1 12 years ago

http://outfrontonline.com/ofcnow/man-in-u-k-turns-gay-after-a-brain-injury/

[–] katiefanatic-791-306918 9 years ago

that's the stupidest thing i've ever heard. i was slapped as a kid. i don't go around slapping other people. you know what it DID teach me? that actions have consequences. that you can't go around saying and doing disrespectful things because those will have larger consequences then just a slap, like a divorce, or jail or whatever else the consequence is depending on who you hurt.

paige was an awful person after her accident. i don't see why leo wasted so much time on her.

[–] AfroGeek 11 years ago

My problem with the movie wasn't that her behavior changed, it's how she kept switching back and forth. If you're dissatisfied with your life and decide to change your path like she does in law school, it's not like going back 5 years in memory will make her love her old life again. She should have still had the same reservations. And, if the brain damage made her like being a sorority girl again, then she shouldn't have wanted to later rekindle with Channing. It's like the movie tries to have it both ways.

Amy: I swear to God...I swear to God! That is NOT how you treat your human!

[–] DanaShelbyChancey 11 years ago

It can, and you may not believe it until you see it.

A man who rents space in the building I work in, was operated on for a brain tumor. People who knew him before said he used to be quiet, businesslike and sort of dull.

Now, he is all social, flirts with the women, and won't shutup. He says some inappropriate things, but everyone puts up with it.

[–] DeputyDippity 10 years ago

It's realistic, but it still kills the movie.

I`m sorry for my lack of manners, but I`m not used to escorting men.

[–] packerpassion4 10 years ago

My problem is why only the 5 years she was estranged from her family being the only memories not recovered? That seems very unrealistic. How can she have memories of her childhood but not more recent ones with her husband and her new friends? I know this happens in althzeimers patients but in a head injury I find that hard to believe.

[–] Rpdsf 10 years ago

Yeah but she wasn't forced to go see Jeremy. As far as trying to piece together her life, she knows she's married, that for some reason drastically changed her life, was told by Jeremy that she dumped him, that he was now in a year long relationship with another girl and she kisses him? What was she thinking? Her personality hadn't changed that drastically. She wasn't a vegetable and still displayed some common sense. So why did she kiss him?

[–] HenryCW 9 years ago

The part I find most unbelievable was that in her state the father was still able to get her back into Law School and have her previous credits counted. Setting aside the question whether the loss of five years of memory could have been so precise and clear-cut, who could have told what knowledge had been wiped out from her memory? Whatever the father's relations were with the University, that could not have happened. The most the University Administration could do in such a situation would be to ask her to retake all the necessary examinations and then apply for entry again. I know little about the true story on which the film was based, but I am pretty certain that part was just invented.