Gran tells how she began speaking with Edinburgh accent after brain injury
A GRAN developed a strong Edinburgh accent after being hit with a door at work and suffering a life-changing brain injury.
Jan Bunch, 57, believed she’d only been cut when the metal door of a fuse box struck her in the freak accident.
She was stitched up and sent home from hospital within hours - but the seriousness of her injury soon became apparent.
The mum-of-two was unable to form proper sentences and reverted to speaking with an Edinburgh accent - despite leaving the city 35 years earlier.
Jan had tests and was diagnosed with postconcussion syndrome.
Jan, from Renfrew, said: “I come from Edinburgh originally but it was very strange. I had all the dialect and I couldn’t understand where it had come from.
“I was getting words back to front and one of the symptoms was when people were speaking, I’d finish their sentences.”
She told how she became isolated, depressed and anxious. Jan - a site supervisor for an engineering firm at the time of the accident in May 2017 - added: “I started
BY ALAN McEWEN being quite reclusive and trying not to speak.
“I was scared in case I said anything wrong. I was very down. It was like balancing on a tightrope - I didn’t know if I was going to fall.”
Jan was introduced to Quarriers’ Sunshine Club, which supports people living with brain injuries in Renfrewshire.
She said: “Three years down the line and I have coped with it all quite well, - but that is all down to Quarriers and everything they have done for me.
“They listened when it was hard to tell my family how I was feeling.”
The gran now dedicates much of her time to others experiencing the despair she felt. She recently secured a job as a Quarriers relief project worker to help at the Sunshine Club.
She said: “I desperately want to give back to Quarriers. The service and staff are my lifeline, my future. The Sunshine Club has made me look at life positively and trained my brain to look at the positives, not the negatives.
“There will be a lot of people feeling the way I did on the first day and, if I can help them, it’s 100 per cent worth it.”