Wow!, what a couple of years (Part 1)

It was July 2010, I'd handed my notice in at work and was looking forward to a months break. I'd also recently just signed a contract for the car of my dreams, a  brand new BMW Z5.

I picked up the car on my wife's birthday, I'd arranged the days events previously and was then advised at the last moment that the car would be available to be picked up. I enjoyed the next few weeks driving around in this awesome car; life just couldn't get better.

It was now the middle of August and I'd just started looking for my next role, being choosey about what I was willing to apply for and was holding out for a good salary. I'd thought I'd found a role, applied for this and had an initial interview on 16th Aug 2010 which went really well and was to lead to a second interview on the 23rd Aug.

I'd had an Operation on the 17th Aug 2010, which was a reasonably simple Out-patient appointment that still required a general anesthetic, with my wife giving me a lift home. I was given Opiate based pain killers and used these as prescribed to keep the pain away. On the Friday night my wife advised me that she would be sleeping in the spare room as my snoring was too much,  especially whilst taking the Opiate based pain killers and my excessive weight causing me to have sleep apnea; she'd had a horrendous night on the Thursday and really benefited from a good nights sleep.

We had a pretty good day on the Saturday, around the local shopping centre, having a pretty relaxing time and I remember that we were looking at spectacle frames. We finished the day off by going around a friend's place for dinner. It was an enjoyable night, I didn't drink because of my medication and we left around midnight and went home to bed. I woke up about 0230hrs needing the bathroom, finished up and little did I know that my life was about to change dramatically in about 3 hours.

At 0530hrs on the 22nd Aug 2010 I awoke and was just suffering from my first stoke. I regained consciousness around 0730hrs and was in an Emergency ward after suffering a second stroke, being transferred via ambulance and being resuscitated.

I was taken into the High Dependency Unit (HDU) of the Neurology ward, unable to speak, swallow or move my right had side and all I wanted to do was sleep: my second stroke had caused hemiparesis to my right had side. Although I was extremely sleepy my memory of the MRI will remain with em forever.

I was wheeled down the corridors to undergo an MRI, I couldn't move and was on my back watch the lights go by overhead, I remember thinking this is like on the TV. I was moved onto the MRI machine flat on my back. I was very concerned that I may choke and was extremely frightened when my head was placed in a frame so that I couldn't move. The bed moved onto the small cylinder and all i could see was a small mirror that enabled me to have a tiny view out of the machine. I was extremely close to having a panic attack and was feeling the most scared in my life. The noise was extremely loud and the time in here was definitely the worst in my life so far. I returned from the MRI saying that I didn't want a second MRI and it was really scary, I've never been so frightened of being sick, not being able to swallow and not being able to communicate to someone that I couldn't see.


 My wife and daughter were advised before they departed that I may not see the night out and that they wouldn't be able to provide any prognosis until there had been no depreciation over 24 hours.

When my family came in the next day my condition hadn't changed. This was to be day 1 post the stroke and the next few months were counted by additional days rather than dates or days of the week.

My improvement started on day 3, when I could move the very tip of my thumb and bend my knee very slightly: talking aloud to my hand and fingers did not appear to be making any difference. over the next few days I was placed on my legs, achieved covering 3 metres walking but could not control the muscles in my right leg and hyper-extended my right knee when trying to take steps, this remained for over 60 days.

In my first week at the hospital I'd had Scans, and MRI and an analysis of my heart. My blood pressure wasn't high, my cholesterol wasn't high and there were no reasons that could be found that had caused my strokes. It was day seven and I advised my wife that I was having a blue day, asked her to leave me on my own, after only an hour of visiting. After about an hour on my own I rang my wife again and asked her to return, I started crying and didn't stop for the next hour, sobbing aloud an causing a relative who was visiting another patient who tried to console me. This day was the turning point of my recovery: the day I realised that it was I that could accept my situation or strive to recover.

During the end of my first week my daughter made a suggestion of undertaking the "Run Melbourne" 5 Km in July 2011. This was to be one of my major goals to undertake this in either a wheel chair, partially walking or undertaking the whole event. So the three of us agreed that we would undertake this

I remained in hospital for a further week, daily escaping in a wheelchair with my wife pushing, and going to the hospital coffee shop. On day 15 I was transferred to a rehabilitation unit, by ambulance as I couldn't transfer from the wheelchair to the car.

I spent 20 days in the Victorian Rehab unit, undertaking physio-therapy, speech therapy, occupational-therapy for my upper limb and water-therapy. As well as walking myself as far as I could, covering distances from 30 metres to a distance of approx 100 metres over the weeks. On day 26 I was allowed to have a day out with my wife and conquered transferring to the car although extremely tired I now wanted to go home

It was my first week at home and I wanted to go to a Stroke support group, there happened to be the Stroke Association of Victoria support group that held it's meetings not 500 metres from my house, I touched base with the secretary beforehand and went to the group. I was amazed, they were a friendly bunch but when the chairman asked what the group had achieved that during he last fortnight, the biggest accomplishment was that someone had received a watch for their birthday. I walked out of the group and back home, promising myself that this was not going to be my life.

After returning home I was contacted by my local community hospital, that was only 1500 metres from our house to undertake my therapies.

To be continued...................