On the 5th May I suffered multiple strokes while I slept. Not one to do things by half, I was wild camping on Tiree with my son (14 years) at the time, I managed to call an ambulance and was airlifted to Queen Elizabeth hospital in Glasgow.
Recovery has been amazing, unable to walk to running and cycling after 4 weeks, however, finding things frustrating for a number of reasons,
1. Not sure I’ll get back to previous fitness levels;
2. Don’t understand why I had a stroke and, more importantly, how I can prevent a recurrence; and
3. Flow of information from health care professionals, I explained it to my wife as needing a project manager for my recovery who could ensure all tests etc. were conducted and feedback given.
Hi Andy. Welcome to our forum. Four weeks is an amazingly short time, so your current progress after stroke is remarkable. Recovery varies from individual to individual and depends on a lot of factors such as the severity of the stroke, what parts of the body were affected and your age and level of fitness.
Many of us cannot understand why we had strokes, but your medical records should tell you what type of stroke it was. Most of us considered ourselves fairly fit before our strokes. Stroke was the last thing I expected and there is no history of it in my family.
Stroke brings its own anxieties and mood changes. It can also bring post stroke fatigue. Three years on I still have to nap for an hour at midday, but I am probably much older than you. Fear of another stroke is common to many of us, but fear eases with time.
Recovering fitness is hard and has to be worked at. You do not say what parts of your body were affected, but you seem to have recovered quickly and are now quite able bodied again. I am partly disabled and will keep working for better fitness but age is against me.
The medical profession are not very forthcoming in terms of information or follow ups. You should get a review in six months time but that is all I got. It’s taken that as you are alive and functioning that’s it. As you know the NHS is very cash strapped, so perhaps one should not expect too much. I’m sure your wife and family must be very glad to have you back and in such good condition. Your lad must have been quite frightened at what occurred when you were both on holiday.
You will find good friends on this forum, so ask anything you want and someone will always reply. My very best wishes to you and your family.
As always, John has given you sound advice from his wealth of experience. Please do accept each part of your recovery as a plus and do not dwell on the bits that have not recovered.
I hope your doctors have gone through ways to reduce the chances of another stroke. If not then I urge you to get your GP to refer you for some help. Most of us are on medication to keep BP in check, thin blood and deal with cholestrol issues.
A problem for a stroke survivor is that each one of us have a different outcome from stroke. So medics can not give us the info that we would like. In simple terms, you have wiped out a huge number of your brain cells. The chances of any one else wiping out the same number of cells is tiny. The chances of anyone else wiping out the same cells is nigh on nil. Add that to the apparent fact that each of us use cells in differing locations and you will then grasp why no one has the same stroke as you.
Why this forum is so good: Many of us have some of the same issues. So we can compare notes and pick out bits that will help ourselves. You are the project manager. Only you can help yourself. No one else can do it. Others will try but its so much a self heal scenario. You and I share a common factor in that we both recovered a lot of our limbs within a short time. This is pretty unusual. No one else was walking on my ward. Just me. Paralysed to walking (well staggering) in five days. I viewed that as a miracle.
It is impossible for you to return to the same as pre stroke. The dead cells are dead and do not regrow. Your amazing brain will work around the dead bits to provide alternative routes. So at least consider that there was old Andy and now its going to rise as New Andy. Pure physical fitness might be recoverable. Stroke does not damage limbs. It just wrecks the messaging sysytem.
Please allow your brain to do its work. It needs rest and it needs water. So keep up hydration and rest whenever your body is telling you to rest.
You have no doubt read the stroke assocaiation leaflets. If not then please read them. Lots of essential info in those leaflets.
Delighted you seem to be recovering fast, show us all the way !