AN IRISHMAN who sustained devastating brain injuries after being attacked by a stranger eight years ago wants people to learn from what happened to him.
Brian Hogan, 40, was a 32-year-old senior quantity surveyor at a firm in Nottingham when he was assaulted in an unprovoked attack.
Mr Hogan had been walking home with friends from a club in Nottingham when Slack approached the group and punched him before he could react.
He was knocked unconscious but quickly came to. After the altercation, he didn’t seek medical treatment and went home, not knowing his brain was bleeding internally.
Mr Hogan was rushed to hospital the next morning and had part of his skull removed to take pressure off his brain. He didn’t wake up again for three months.
His family, who all lived in Limerick, flew to Britain and were by his beside as he began a slow, gruelling recovery.
He told The Irish Post: “When I was in the coma in hospital, the nurses told my family ‘he can still hear you so no crying in this room, be positive’.
“We are a very close family and have a great sense of humour. My mum made a dirty joke and when it came to the punchline, I wagged my foot and my finger and the nurses told them to keep telling me jokes.
“That helped my stats stabilise so they took me out of the induced coma. That was when I discovered, to my horror, that I was blind.”
Since Martin Slack was released after a conviction for grievous bodily harm in 2010, Mr Hogan has had to relearn to talk and walk with aids, as well as come to terms with the loss of his vision.
“When you lose something like your ability to speak – something we learn as babies – it’s much, much more difficult to do that when you’re 33.
“My mother is always trying to pull a laugh out of sad situations, which has saved me.
“She told someone recently ‘the trouble with Brian was trying to get him to talk again, now we can’t get him to shut up!’”
Mr Hogan spent a year in a rehabilitation centre in Ireland and now lives in a rehab facility in Co. Clare run by Acquired Brain Injury Ireland (ABII).
He credits ABII with helping him get to the point where, at 40, he is aiming to live independently again.
“They have been fantastic with helping me regain independence and I can’t thank them enough.
“ABII have always reminded me that there’s light at the end of the tunnel and encouraged me to plough on.
“I’ve also been lucky to have a great support network of family and friends. Some people with acquired brain injuries don’t have that and I don’t know how they do it.
“Everyone has really stepped up to the plate and helped me keep positive.”
Mr Hogan wants people – the young and sociable especially – to learn from what happened to him.
“I’ve given talks to ten schools now as well as community groups and other interests parties telling them about my story and educating them about the dangers of what can happen due to a head injury on a night out.
“I was a fit person and I was very much into my fitness. I went to the gym four mornings a week before work and I never took a day off sick, this can happen to anyone.
“If just one person learns from the mistake I made – in not going straight to the hospital after I banged my head – if that person gets medical help at the right time, then it was worth it.”
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