A little story about a 44 year old man's experience.
22nd August was Sunday morning, dawn hadn’t even cracked, it was 0530hrs and he thought he was just waking up because he needed to use the on-suite. How he wishes that morning had of been like any other.
He was half asleep and tried to move himself off the bed, a normal move was to swing his legs around and sit on the side of the bed. Although he went through this in his head, he realised that he was still lying in the same position, although he’d mentally gone through sitting up, this suddenly brought him to his senses. On realising that he was making noises, as he had done on a couple of occasions whilst having a nightmare; however this time the nightmare was a reality.
He looked over to his wife, as all he could control was above his neck and her eyes opened, he said “Help Me!” and her immediate response was, "Are you awake?" He was unable to string a quick sentence together and said, “I can’t move. Help me!” This sounded really awkward and they both knew that something was wrong.
He sat on the edge of the bed, aided by his wife as he was unable to do this himself. They tried to move him to the en-suite as he felt nauseous. he tried to stand and failed on numerous attempts, he managed to wedge himself into a doorway and made his way to the toilet on all fours, after using a towel rail to steady himself: He had vertigo, he was unable to balance and had to go to the floor before he fell there.
He clung to the toilet bowl for what felt was a couple of minutes, but in reality was, more like 20 minutes; He’d been falling in and out of consciousness. He thought he could make it to the car, so his wife could drive them to the hospital faster than an ambulance turning out. He proceeded to move from the toilet on all fours and they tried to move him onto the bed. Any strength he had was draining from his body, he couldn’t drag himself on the bed even with his wife’s assistance. He was stuck on an open floor, lying at the foot of the bed and his wife managed to put some tracksuit pants on him as his major concern was that he was dressed: Not
understanding that he was having a stroke.
He was lying at the foot of the bed, unable to drag himself any further, unable to speak clearly. It was like he was talking from an autocue. He could see all the words that he wanted to say but the autocue was broken and moving too quickly. He felt that he was only allowed to say a word so long as it was on the screen and
therefore could only say really short, single syllable words.
His concern was that he wasn’t spoken to like a child, ensuring his wife knew he understood her and everything that was going on. He indicated to his wife that he wanted to communicate to her, he could not speak well enough so he must had mimed writing. She brought a pencil and paper as well as a computer. He was still able to move both hands and proceeded to type out that he understood everything. It was amazing, on glancing at the letters on the screen they were garbled, however his wife quickly realised that his fingers were on the wrong bank of keys to start with and managed to decrypt what was a mess of letters.
He’d fallen in and out of consciousness during this time and his wife had called an ambulance. The paramedics were in attendance and wondered how they were going to undertake a transfer from the floor to the ambulance downstairs. They have steps for both the rear and front entrances, the rear being un-even and
steep, the front being narrow with a U-turn. He was moved down in a collapsible wheelchair, identical to those used by airlines, with oxygen: this required 5 people to move him down the front steps.
As mentioned, he was falling in and out of consciousness and awoke very briefly halfway down the stairs, then being transferred into an ambulance at the top of the drive. He then recalls being transferred to a second ambulance that was located on the road at the bottom of the drive.
He remembers the ambulance doors closing and the driver saying that Box Hill had been put on bypass and they were to go to the Monash. He doesn’t remember any more of the journey but was later told that he had arrected in the ambulance. Thankfully due to the prompt actions of the Emergency crew he was delivered to the Emergency department alive. The next time he came to was in the Emergency department surrounded by lots of people, screens, wires and the hum of people being extremely busy around him. He was only conscious for about 30 seconds and lost consciousness.
The next few hours were much the same prior to going for an MRI. He remembers the MRI well as this was the scariest he'd ever been in his life, even more than someone holding a loaded weapon at him. This was scary because he was not in control. All he could move were his mouth and eyes as he'd been strapped in to remain still, he was still feeling nauseous and was afraid that he would be sick and unable to deal with this. There were tears in his eyes and he knew that he needed to stay awake through the next 10 minutes.
He had no issue with pain or headaches throughout all of this; in fact all he wanted to do was sleep.
After ungoing this MRI and two brain scans he didn't recieve any medication, there was nothing that the medical staff could do to fix or prevent anything, it was a case of monitoring the patient in-case of any negative signs or symptoms.
After approx' 8 hours in the Emergency department he was moved to the High dependency ward of the Neurology ward, this was because he couldn't swallow or turn over, which meant he needed additional attention whilst he was sleeping.
Throughout all of this he had no idea of the mental anguish that family and friends were going through.
Friday, 17 June 2011
Tuesday, 14 June 2011
Suddenly I'd lost my driving licence
Did you know that after a stroke your driving license is automatically revoked.
At first I wasn't fazed by losing my driving licence, I was too focused on my own recovery and walking for this to be of a concern. This later became quite awkward as I was having to go outside of my local vicinity for the next phases of my recovery.
I had no plans to go driving in a car, I knew that my motor skills were shot and my ability to concentrate with my ability for observation outside of my central vision was really poor. Overall I was too dangerous to be behind the wheel of a car.
The first occasion that I missed my ability to drive was to go to the Knox leisure works swimming pool, a distance of 6,5kms approx 15 mins drive, door to door. Instead I had to walk and take the train and walk at my destination station. The walk to the station took about 25 minutes in my condition, the train journey was 5 mins and the walk from Boronia station to Knox Leisure Works swimming pool was 20 minutes. With waiting time at the station was about an hour for a 15 minute trip in the car. This was a regular journey that was undertaken twice a week. I had to allow a whole morning for a 40 minute session in the pool.
My other therapy was visiting an Oesteopath, and this was a real eye opener. This was approx a 1km journey that required me to walk 25 mins to the train station, a train journey of 22 mins and then a trip on a bus for about 7.5kms. So a 25 minute car ride took about 1hr 40 mins, with waiting time.
My first time of sitting in the drivers seat was under close supervision of the wife, it was about 2 months after the stroke. We went to an empty car park where I would try to maneouvre the car from one space to another. I found that I couldn't control my foot to take very small movements. We wither accelerated quite quickly or broke very sharpely, thankfully we both wore our seat belts otherwise my wife would have had a headache or a broken nose from the dash-board. I agreed that it was too soon to undertake my assessment and also that we'd revisit this in two weeks.
After two weeks we tried again, this time the acceleration was alot smoother but still un-safe if there were other parked cars around but the breaking was very sharp. Another 2 weeks grace was agreed.
After another 2 weeks the driving was a slight improvement and we agreed that I should put in for my assessment.
Prior to the assessment I also had to undertake some eye checks, because I have toxoplasmosis and only have central vision in one eye, I was required by Vic Roads to verify that my vision had not been affected by the stroke. Thankfully this wasn't the case, I passed the peripheral field tests and my vision had been passed by an opthalmologist fit enough to drive.
The Vic roads assessment is required to ensure one is safe on the road, this was not an assessment of my driving skills but that I was not going to be a danger to myself or others on the road. The assessment was undertaken with a dual controlled driving instructors car with a driving instructor in the front passenger seat with the Occupational Therapist, with their Vic Roads hat on in the back seat.
My assessment was booked, I had to wait 3 weeks for a vacancy but this allowed for 3 weeks additional recovery time. I was immediately asked to take the drivers seat and we proceeded to go through the assessment. The pressures were much like that of a driving test and I had to remind myself that my driving itself was not being assessed. We did brake a bit sharply on one occasion but we arrived back all safe, I'd passed!
The first time I took the car out was a very nerve racking experience, it's much like taking your parents car out on your own for the first couple of times. I was still either accelerating really quickly or bracking a bit too sharply, however these becoming less often.
I'd become a really poor driver, much like someone who was a little bit too tense behind the wheel. Thankfully this is improving, I'm certainly improving a lot over time and say thanks to my wife for her bravery in allowing me to drive occasionally.
At first I wasn't fazed by losing my driving licence, I was too focused on my own recovery and walking for this to be of a concern. This later became quite awkward as I was having to go outside of my local vicinity for the next phases of my recovery.
I had no plans to go driving in a car, I knew that my motor skills were shot and my ability to concentrate with my ability for observation outside of my central vision was really poor. Overall I was too dangerous to be behind the wheel of a car.
The first occasion that I missed my ability to drive was to go to the Knox leisure works swimming pool, a distance of 6,5kms approx 15 mins drive, door to door. Instead I had to walk and take the train and walk at my destination station. The walk to the station took about 25 minutes in my condition, the train journey was 5 mins and the walk from Boronia station to Knox Leisure Works swimming pool was 20 minutes. With waiting time at the station was about an hour for a 15 minute trip in the car. This was a regular journey that was undertaken twice a week. I had to allow a whole morning for a 40 minute session in the pool.
My other therapy was visiting an Oesteopath, and this was a real eye opener. This was approx a 1km journey that required me to walk 25 mins to the train station, a train journey of 22 mins and then a trip on a bus for about 7.5kms. So a 25 minute car ride took about 1hr 40 mins, with waiting time.
My first time of sitting in the drivers seat was under close supervision of the wife, it was about 2 months after the stroke. We went to an empty car park where I would try to maneouvre the car from one space to another. I found that I couldn't control my foot to take very small movements. We wither accelerated quite quickly or broke very sharpely, thankfully we both wore our seat belts otherwise my wife would have had a headache or a broken nose from the dash-board. I agreed that it was too soon to undertake my assessment and also that we'd revisit this in two weeks.
After two weeks we tried again, this time the acceleration was alot smoother but still un-safe if there were other parked cars around but the breaking was very sharp. Another 2 weeks grace was agreed.
After another 2 weeks the driving was a slight improvement and we agreed that I should put in for my assessment.
Prior to the assessment I also had to undertake some eye checks, because I have toxoplasmosis and only have central vision in one eye, I was required by Vic Roads to verify that my vision had not been affected by the stroke. Thankfully this wasn't the case, I passed the peripheral field tests and my vision had been passed by an opthalmologist fit enough to drive.
The Vic roads assessment is required to ensure one is safe on the road, this was not an assessment of my driving skills but that I was not going to be a danger to myself or others on the road. The assessment was undertaken with a dual controlled driving instructors car with a driving instructor in the front passenger seat with the Occupational Therapist, with their Vic Roads hat on in the back seat.
My assessment was booked, I had to wait 3 weeks for a vacancy but this allowed for 3 weeks additional recovery time. I was immediately asked to take the drivers seat and we proceeded to go through the assessment. The pressures were much like that of a driving test and I had to remind myself that my driving itself was not being assessed. We did brake a bit sharply on one occasion but we arrived back all safe, I'd passed!
The first time I took the car out was a very nerve racking experience, it's much like taking your parents car out on your own for the first couple of times. I was still either accelerating really quickly or bracking a bit too sharply, however these becoming less often.
I'd become a really poor driver, much like someone who was a little bit too tense behind the wheel. Thankfully this is improving, I'm certainly improving a lot over time and say thanks to my wife for her bravery in allowing me to drive occasionally.
Saturday, 11 June 2011
Learning to write again
When I'd regained enough strength to fight gravity, and worked to recover my ability on picking up and holding a pen I initially tried to write. Wow this was a big shock, I couldn't!
I'll explain what I mean by that. Well due to the impact of one stroke my motor skills were affected, this meant that I couldn't initially move my fingers, hand and arm, this was my major motor skills. Little did I know was that the same happened to my fine motor skills, I couldn't undertake small movements or move the small muscles quickly. Also I was unable to apply constant pressure, my muscles couldn't undertake this sort of workout and would work extremely sporadically. This meant I was unable to draw a straight line and I was unable to draw short distances, full stops, commas, speech marks. These were just too difficult.
I'd learned in my earlier years the typing of one sentence to prove all the letters of a mechanical keyboard worked correctly (Seriously I'm not that old), so I used this to write my first sentence, as it would use all the letters of the alphabet; this sentence is:
"The quick brown fox jumps over the lazy dog"
It was around around 5 weeks before I wrote this sentence for the first time. I managed to complete it, stopping on numerous occasions, Sizing and spacing were all over the place, I wrote each letter separately, every line was jagged and it took me approx 2 minutes 30 seconds. I was writing like a 4 year old hat new their alphabet, but slower.
I kept up the tracing, keeping the sheet and dating it. I was noticing an improvement but also noticed that if I didn't practice things weren't miraculously going to fix itself. We put a timetable together which was my job, my job being to work at my recovery. I sat down and wrote for approx an 30 mins to an hour a day, Monday through Friday.
My controls improved immensely and I then tried to do joined up writing. This was a real shock as I again couldn't! I'd forgotten haw to join letters together. I'd asked my daughter to get me some basic writing books. The sort that are used if you want to help your kid at home. I used these to try and fix my ability of joining these letters and continued to work my way through these books.
After 2 months I'd recovered enough to think about looking for a job, it was January 2011 and I was really ashamed of my handwriting. I could write legibly but this was slow, untidy and looked like it had been produced by a child.
It's now June 2011, my writing is still slow, slightly more improved but there is one major exception: I'm no longer ashamed.
Thursday, 9 June 2011
Running - Really it.s not that easy
After the stroke I'd been left with right sided paralysis, all my right sided muscles being wiped of all strength, arms, legs, foot, toe and torso.
After 3 months of recovery and rehab I really wanted to go out for a run. This wasn't something that I loved to do before hand but I felt I needed to prove to myself that I was could be as good as new
I went out with the idea of having a jog, I still had a bit of difficulty with walking, but not enough for me to have second thoughts. I started by walking slightly quicker and then thought about breaking into a jog.
The first few steps were very strange, my left side was working as normal but my right side felt very awkward. When taking a pace with my right foot I felt and pressure in every bones and joints of my lower left limb.
The feeling was not only very awkward but painful, my bones were feeling the impact and indirectly transferring this impact to joints and connecting bones. I initially described this as if my right leg was mad of wood, however a better description was like a very highly compact piece of rubber.
I realised that my suspension had been forgotten. My muscles either turned on or off, where as muscles don't often work at their full capacity and often work in conjunction with each other. If one muscled cannot work at the required capacity then another muscle automatically tries to help. In my situation my muscles didn't know how to restrict their output and all tried to work at their full capacity. This then caused the awkward sensations in my running.
I called this session to an abrupt halt, after no more than 50 metres. I wanted to run but knew that if I persisted I would be causing damage to my bones and limbs. I walked home wondering how I was going to train this leg and came up with an idea of going to the swimming pool.
I took to the pool the next day, taking the train and walking as I was unable to drive. Once in the water I wondered what I was going to do? Since the major problem was that I had no suspension I thought "Hop". So I took to the shallow end, using as much depth of water to be comfortable and proceeded to hop. I was going really well and went to the swimming pool 3 times a week. I proceeded to hop for 5 minutes, reducing the amount of depth and counted the amount of hops over a set distance. I also joined pensioners and unfit people in an aquasise class but this is another story.
After undertaking around 1 month of hopping in the water I decided to give running a go again as the scenery was going to be more exciting. I went out for the run and found that things had improved quite a bit, my lower limb felt like the piece of rubber had become more pliable, I still didn't have the suspension working properly and it felt as if it was 60% there.
I made a decision after the run that I'd give it another couple of goes and If there was very little or no improvement I'd go back in the pool, hopping again. Thankfully I felt slight improvement and continued jogging.
As well as the suspension issue my stride in both legs was smaller than normal. My calf muscle and achilles tendon suffered. I was stretching these out but out on one run I'd covered only about 500 metres and I had excruciating pain, so much so that I had to stop running and walked back. This led to a twice weekly visit for a sports massage. This was the most painful part in my whole rehab but after 3 weeks I was good to go again.
After starting work my jogs started to reduce and quickly reduced to zero. I went out for a jog at the weekend and it was amazing! I felt like I was 95% there, I'd improved through time and going to a personal trainer working on getting the muscles to work properly.
I have a charity run lined up on the 17th July, ( http://www.runmelbourne.com.au/cmspage.php?intid=199&intversion=7 ) I hope to be slightly better however even so happy that I can run around this circuit unlike many others that have had a stroke........... Wish me luck :o)
After 3 months of recovery and rehab I really wanted to go out for a run. This wasn't something that I loved to do before hand but I felt I needed to prove to myself that I was could be as good as new
I went out with the idea of having a jog, I still had a bit of difficulty with walking, but not enough for me to have second thoughts. I started by walking slightly quicker and then thought about breaking into a jog.
The first few steps were very strange, my left side was working as normal but my right side felt very awkward. When taking a pace with my right foot I felt and pressure in every bones and joints of my lower left limb.
The feeling was not only very awkward but painful, my bones were feeling the impact and indirectly transferring this impact to joints and connecting bones. I initially described this as if my right leg was mad of wood, however a better description was like a very highly compact piece of rubber.
I realised that my suspension had been forgotten. My muscles either turned on or off, where as muscles don't often work at their full capacity and often work in conjunction with each other. If one muscled cannot work at the required capacity then another muscle automatically tries to help. In my situation my muscles didn't know how to restrict their output and all tried to work at their full capacity. This then caused the awkward sensations in my running.
I called this session to an abrupt halt, after no more than 50 metres. I wanted to run but knew that if I persisted I would be causing damage to my bones and limbs. I walked home wondering how I was going to train this leg and came up with an idea of going to the swimming pool.
I took to the pool the next day, taking the train and walking as I was unable to drive. Once in the water I wondered what I was going to do? Since the major problem was that I had no suspension I thought "Hop". So I took to the shallow end, using as much depth of water to be comfortable and proceeded to hop. I was going really well and went to the swimming pool 3 times a week. I proceeded to hop for 5 minutes, reducing the amount of depth and counted the amount of hops over a set distance. I also joined pensioners and unfit people in an aquasise class but this is another story.
After undertaking around 1 month of hopping in the water I decided to give running a go again as the scenery was going to be more exciting. I went out for the run and found that things had improved quite a bit, my lower limb felt like the piece of rubber had become more pliable, I still didn't have the suspension working properly and it felt as if it was 60% there.
I made a decision after the run that I'd give it another couple of goes and If there was very little or no improvement I'd go back in the pool, hopping again. Thankfully I felt slight improvement and continued jogging.
As well as the suspension issue my stride in both legs was smaller than normal. My calf muscle and achilles tendon suffered. I was stretching these out but out on one run I'd covered only about 500 metres and I had excruciating pain, so much so that I had to stop running and walked back. This led to a twice weekly visit for a sports massage. This was the most painful part in my whole rehab but after 3 weeks I was good to go again.
After starting work my jogs started to reduce and quickly reduced to zero. I went out for a jog at the weekend and it was amazing! I felt like I was 95% there, I'd improved through time and going to a personal trainer working on getting the muscles to work properly.
I have a charity run lined up on the 17th July, ( http://www.runmelbourne.com.au/cmspage.php?intid=199&intversion=7 ) I hope to be slightly better however even so happy that I can run around this circuit unlike many others that have had a stroke........... Wish me luck :o)
Monday, 6 June 2011
Are we too wrapped in our own lives..........Or is there something that I'm missing?
This is a sort of rhetorical question but I do wonder.
So I'm doing a bit of a run, it's 5kms, so wouldn't be very difficult for a the average person, I sent out sponsorship links to friends, family and colleagues who I thought would sponsor me. I'm not doing this for me but to raise a small amount of money for others.
I was obviously wrong to believe that the people I knew were like minded, maybe it's a perspective thing but I am so confused that there has been such little response. The very few people that have donated have been awesome, some high amounts and others lower but that doesn't matter. I am really appreciative for anyone that had donated. In my mind I have linked these donations with peoples acknowledgement of the tough road to recovery that I've had to travel myself.
With those that saw me after the stroke, colleagues that have read my story and people that new me before, I expected a different outcome. I believe that people are too wrapped up on their own misery to look up and see that there are people in need that have not brought it on themselves. I sometimes briefly think, "If only they knew" but then I couldn't wish anything this bad on my worst enemy.
I say to myself that it isn't their fault, they are the people that need help but that doesn't help those that can't help themselves
Well this doesn't deter me, even though it was only be 10 months ago that I couldn't walk more than 100 metres before I had to stop. I know that I have exceeded what the medical profession expected and I will make a full recovery, maybe I've been given the opportunity to see what it's like on the otherside that has changed my perspective, I thought that I was generous by giving to a friend who was doing something for charity, but maybe I was the same as the majority.
So I'm doing a bit of a run, it's 5kms, so wouldn't be very difficult for a the average person, I sent out sponsorship links to friends, family and colleagues who I thought would sponsor me. I'm not doing this for me but to raise a small amount of money for others.
I was obviously wrong to believe that the people I knew were like minded, maybe it's a perspective thing but I am so confused that there has been such little response. The very few people that have donated have been awesome, some high amounts and others lower but that doesn't matter. I am really appreciative for anyone that had donated. In my mind I have linked these donations with peoples acknowledgement of the tough road to recovery that I've had to travel myself.
With those that saw me after the stroke, colleagues that have read my story and people that new me before, I expected a different outcome. I believe that people are too wrapped up on their own misery to look up and see that there are people in need that have not brought it on themselves. I sometimes briefly think, "If only they knew" but then I couldn't wish anything this bad on my worst enemy.
I say to myself that it isn't their fault, they are the people that need help but that doesn't help those that can't help themselves
Well this doesn't deter me, even though it was only be 10 months ago that I couldn't walk more than 100 metres before I had to stop. I know that I have exceeded what the medical profession expected and I will make a full recovery, maybe I've been given the opportunity to see what it's like on the otherside that has changed my perspective, I thought that I was generous by giving to a friend who was doing something for charity, but maybe I was the same as the majority.
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