So, coming out of hospital, and the following is ringing in my ears - whatever you don’t get back in 8 weeks, you’re probably not getting back!
Anyone else hear that “advice”?
Here I am 4 years etc on, and I think I made more progress in the last 6 months than the previous 42.
This isn’t for everyone but it might suggest a path, hence the sharing. I was into martial arts before my stroke, and honestly believe it was my fitness that carried me through, and compensated a lot for the loss of one side initially. Getting better slowly.
Anyway I tried for ages to get back into it, got turned down (rightly) by many schools as it was too dangerous for me. And then I found a school where the teacher (sensei) had a father who had a stroke, and who he was teaching to walk etc. again, but sadly he passed away. And he accepted me as a project.
You have no idea how I struggled until one day a new student who didn’t know about me threw me - there was a gasp, and another gasp as some sort of muscle memory kicked in and the breakfalls I was struggling to do by myself just kicked in. And ever since, while I can’t do a lot of stuff unaided, it seems I can do it when I don’t have to think about it.
So perhaps try things you used to do - they won’t feel right (nothing ever feels right since) but it might just kick in a memory that forces a response?
I think I know what you mean. I haven’t been a stroke survivor for long (about 10 months) and am a long way off making the sort of progress I would like. Mostly it feels like there are bits of me that have stopped working but it is the connections in my brain that have come undone. I have lost use in what used to be my dominant right hand side and I’m having to attempt to deal with things as a left hander. What is strange is that sometimes I can sense my right hand side trying to re-establish its dominance. It hasn’t come back with any completeness but it feels like it either wants to or is trying to. It all sounds a bit mystical but that doesn’t make it any less valid.
It is a bit strange because really these were bits that automatically worked together and which I simply thought of as me. I can see what you mean @Hawumph and how these bits of you could just lock back together working as they are supposed to. I think the process is neither a concious one nor one that simply works on the physical plane, it lies somewhere inside or outside all this and takes place when you are not trying to think about it. (been there, got the ‘T’ shirt)
I am pleased for you that you are starting to make some progress and am wishing for you that you continue to find improvement, as I am sure you will.
The time scale for me has been much shorter, but despite being told that improvement tails off with time, I too have discovered this not to be strictly true. It has cheered me up no end to discover I can make advances I was just not capable of in the early days.
I think you are right. That ‘advice’ is and certainly was erroneous as far as my case is concerned. It also held me in a very negative and dark frame of mind for some time.
I almost feel that, certainly for me, there was an initial period when I needed to rest and recuperate and with no need to actively try to physically recover or to feel I needed to.
To be told there was no need to rush and to ease down and stress less might have been the good advice I never heard.
I recognise that “feeling it wants to re-establish itself”, with me initially it was feelings like almost electric shocks now and then, an occasional almost voluntary twitch in my foot that had been a brick at the end of my leg for months, that sort of thing.
It’s too late for me now but one regret I have is I didn’t journal my progress, you can forget where you were and where you are now,
@Hawumph thank you for sharing your story. I do think theres an element of truth in what you say & sonetimes we perhaps over think things causing it to become unnatural. The challenge is how you stop over thinking.
I have heard of people making progress 20 years post stroke so its never too late. I keep a diary of my progress. Have found it invaluable.
@Hawumph, like you I have not kept a journal, something I will perhaps regret, like you, one day.
I have however documented some of my journey on this Forum in a very public way, though it is a very scattered record, it is there.
A bit like exercise routines, keeping a paper or even a digital record on a daily, weekly, or even regular basis is something my inner self, for want of a better phrase, is very unwilling to maintain. If there is an event or procedure that needs my attention it will get it, but this rhythmical turning of pages irks me. Not sure, actually, how this Zoom thing I have started up is managing to continue day by day. Maybe like stroke recovery it defies those thought processes.
Excuse my diversion. To return, I suggest that it is important for a stroke survivor to try to keep of good heart and to rest and make efforts as it seems is appropriate. We are undoubtedly the best judges of what is good for us, though at times confidence issues mean we need input from outside ourselves. Which is why this Forum and its members is and are so valuable.
All the best and . . .
Hawumph–That “8 week” business you heard is a lot of B.S,! I was totally paralyzed on my left side. It took months of rehab and years of “plugging away”, but now after 4 years, I walk normally a mile a day and play ukulele and piano. Effort, time and attitude can accomplish so much. I read that it was found people who had no rehab, but then started rehab as long as two years after the stroke showed improvement. I have heard that the most dramatic improvement is “SEEN” during the first six months. and that may be so, but that doesn’t mean that improvement stops. I think it keeps on as long as you keep working at it. Jeanne
@Hawumph
It’s still early days for me, but already I’ve progressed further than I would have believed.
I’d just like to confirm that it seems the more you try to do the more able you become.
This gives hope that encourages more effort.
Thanks for sharing the update of your story.
Jeanne
