3rd Anniversary yesterday of a different type.

[koger]

Had my 3rd anniversary yesterday, I had 3 strokes in one day, 3years ago. I was recuperating from having 2 hip surgerys back to back3 weeks apart, due to having MRSA and they had to go in and take the hip out, cut out some dead tissue, then reinstall the hip, put in 400 time released antibiotic beads and sewed me up. 5 weeks later I am doing great, the doc clears me to start PT the next day. I wake up the next moring, and cant see right out of both eyes. I sit up on the edge of the bed, and fall out in the floor with a massive stroke, my entire right side paralyzed and am unable to speak or see well. I ended up laying there for 5 hours, my wife was at work sub teaching. I kept rubbing my right arm and some feeling came back, and I was able to crawl to the phone and call her at work, but could not talk, had to hang up. After 45 minutes I could finally talk, called her and told her what had happened. She came home with an ambulance and got me to the hospital, and after being there 15minutes, I had the second stroke. A hour and a half later I was in the CT Scan and had the 3rd one, both of the last two had pretty bad siezures along with them. I ended up with my right leg paralyzed, and right hand comes and goes. I suffer chonic fatigue and when I get stressed, I display the signs of stroke, such as face droop, toe drop, and slurred speech and so on. They said that the strokes were caused by the infection being prolonged and the trauma of 2 surgeries back to back. It has been a long, long way, and I have recovered a lot in some ways, none in other ways. My short term memory sucks, but I can remember everything before the stroke, all the gunsmithing knowledge from doing it for 36+ years, farming skills, etc. I am still able to do gunsmithing, hunt with the help of my wife, from fields in blinds. My life changed that day forever, and a lot folks say I was lucky. I think not, but blessed by God to be in as good a shape as I am. The neurologists tell me that the fact I can form a lucid thought, talk, walk with a walker or crutches, is a miracle. I try to push myself to do more everyday, in order to retain the progress I have made, instead of rolling around in self pit, and look at all the positives in my life. I try to do what I can to enjoy life and live it to the fullest every day, that usually involves shootina single shot rifle of some type, molding bullets or loading ammo for one. I work to be a more Godly man each day, though I fail at that occasionally. God knows I am a work in progress and I say all this to give God the glory for each accomplishment I have made, and as a testament to how much grattitude I have for him, and my wife who has helped to pull me along thru all this, and helps me do as much as I can. Just thought I would share with you all.

[dangitgriff]

Glad you are alive. Got to be rough. Already told the wife we can’t afford the medical care to keep me alive so if I stroke out or get cancer, don’t bring up treatment. I refuse to bankrupt my family over medical care. I’m worth more dead anyway with insurance payouts.
R/Griff

[Der Gebirgsjager]

Well, Sir, that is a truly awful, but inspiring story. I have some idea of what you've been through, and continue to go through, as my wife had a very bad stroke 10 years ago, and I'm her daily caregiver. She suffered a brain aneurysm and was in the local ICU for 24 hours when she was thought to be dead. But then the attending nurse saw her move a foot, and she was helicoptered to the regional ICU where she was for 30 days before being in Critical Care for another 30 days. After 60 days in a convalescent hospital I got to bring her home. 30 days after that she had a follow up visit to the neurosurgeon who had put a stent in her brain. He said to her, "Charlotte, I can't tell you how glad I am to see you sitting across the desk from me. 50% of people who suffer the kind of stroke you had, with the severity you had, die before reaching the hospital. The other 50% die in the hospital." That sure doesn't leave much wiggle room, but God saw fit to let her survive, and let me keep my best friend for so far 10 more years. She is unable to walk with out a walker, walks very slow, and needs a hand on her back for a little extra support. She also has short term memory loss, lost all memories for about 5 years prior to the stroke, and makes no new memories. If she met you at 12 noon today she would not remember ever having met you by 5 p.m. She does remember me and the other close members of our family because she knew us many years before the event. Her vision is impaired, but she speaks well, can be conversational. We've been best friends for 51 years now, and I'm so happy to still have her. Thank You, Heavenly Father.

God Bless.

DG

[xs11jack]

It is interesting about the lost of short term memory. I lost short term going into the stroke and gained a bunch back afterword. I still have trouble with names of things and I have learned that some of the time I can get the name by visualizing the item I want to say. The docs told me I have what is called White Brain matter disease which grows slowly and eventually causes death. White Brain Matter Disease is not very well known about and that causes problems when trying to diagnose the symptoms. So God's blessings on you all.
Ole Jack

[Texas by God]

God bless you. Hang in there, my friends.

Sent from my SM-A716U using Tapatalk

[Scrounge]

My grandma had senile dementia the last 7 years of her life. Died the morning of her 83'rd birthday. She recognized my mom and uncle as her children when they visited separately, but thought they were my grandpa and his floozy when they visited together.
I've had problems with short term memory quite a bit in the past few years, myself. Finally talked to the doctors about it last year, and they said the interruptions in my sleep were causing it. I was working 3rd shift, and taking SWMBO to frequent doctors appointments and such, as well as my own, so getting 3 or 4 hours of sleep in a day was a pretty common thing. I'm doing a bunch better since I retired, as I can sleep as long as I'm able, go back to bed when I'm tired. It helps me a lot. YMMV, of course.
Also, studies have fairly recently linked the bacteria in the gut to Alzheimer's. https://www.iflscience.com/brain/new-study-confirms-indisputable-link-between-gut-bacteria-and-alzheimers/ It's too early to have any sort of treatment yet.

The big study was only published this month, but there have been people talking about this for a decade or more, so there are some ideas out there. Probiotics as a supplement to the diet are one. Wife and I have been using them on and off for some years. I can tell you from the past couple of years that lack of sleep has more impact, but they may make a difference, too, for at least some people. You can buy supplements to take. Kefir, yogurt, and such have some of the bacteria they think are beneficial, too, and they may help you. I prefer that route, personally. No guarantees, of course, but they taste good to me, so it's no hardship to try them. I had a colonoscopy the beginning of the month, and figured that would be a good time to work on the flora and fauna of my own little gut microbiome.

[375supermag]

Hi...
Keep working on getting better...you can do this.
I had two strokes in 2012 after lung surgery, the first while still in recovery. Very scary situation...
Could not speak well and couldn't remember my children's names, couldn't read the placards on the wall. By the next morning, I was back to normal. No cognitive damage and no physical impairment... neurologist said I was extremely fortunate.
Sometime before a follow-up MRI, I apparently had another more widespread stroke that I didn't even know happened. The MRI showed the damage... neurologist theorizes the second stroke must have occurred while I was sleeping.
I have brain damage but have no physical or intellectual impairment.

You can survive the effects of a stroke and recover.