Brain Injury Survivor: Matthew Kotei

The second of two events with people who have survived brain injury due to illness or accident. The survivors’ unusual journeys highlight not only the ways in which conscious experience can vary hugely from person to person, but also how our state of mind can change dramatically throughout our lives.

Matthew Kotei was homeless for a period when he first arrived from Ghana aged 17. He worked nights and weekends while studying for his degree in computer science at UCL, but within a year of securing his first job, he developed symptoms of a colloid cyst: a life-threatening growth in the middle of his brain. Emergency surgery left him with dense memory impairments and severe fatigue. He will be speaking about ambition and misfortune, his confabulation (false memories) and the stress of continuing to live with the cyst in his head.

Matthew will be in conversation with Headway East London development director Ben Graham and joined by clinician and neuroscientist Vaughan Bell.

This event is in partnership with Headway East London, a charity supporting people affected by brain injury. A pseudonym has been used to protect the speaker’s identity.