If you’re getting complacent and bored, don’t worry, life will throw you a curveball and suddenly things will get more interesting.. Dave and I had settled into the pre-retirement routines imposed by the pandemic, and making as many plans as conditions allowed, when one day Dave woke up “feeling weird”, as he said later.
I was out in the garden, having woken up before him, when he poked his head out the door and mumbled something. I asked him to repeat himself and it didn’t make a lot more sense. I asked him how he’d slept and he said something like, “I’ve screwed it up”. I thought, well, he’s just drowsy and I mentally shrugged it off. He went back inside, made himself toast, eggs and coffee, and when I came into the living room where he was sitting, I again asked him how he was. This time, I grew quite alarmed because he was still not making much sense, plus he was holding his coffee oddly, and seemed unaware that some of it was spilling down his bathrobe. I cried out to him and he seemed to register what I was saying in slow motion. I said, “now you’re scaring me, Dave. I think you might have had a stroke!”. He waved me off, saying he’d “taken a pill last night”. I wasn’t sure what kind of pill he was talking about but it didn’t reassure me. He said he thought he’d go back to bed and against my better judgement, I let him. I was still thinking, stroke, except, what stroke victim wakes up and makes himself a full breakfast and eats it??
When he woke up a couple of hours later, he was worried about a coffee date he’d made with his friend, Mike. I told him I didn’t think he should go, so he called Mike to cancel. Later, Mike told me that he’d found their phone conversation a little odd, but didn’t worry too much about it. Then Dave went back to bed. Before he went to sleep I told him I was still pretty worried and didn’t he think we should go to the hospital? He then explained (very disjointedly) that the pill he had taken to help him sleep was a weed pill, and I thought, ok, maybe it’s normal for THC to affect your speech?? I felt a tiny bit reassured and thought maybe he’d be all better when he completely slept it off.
While he was sleeping I phoned my son, Travis, (the closest to a weed expert I know), and asked him whether he thought the weed pill could make Dave talk strangely. He was a bit doubtful but he acknowledged that weed sometimes messed with your speech centre, and made you think you were making sense when you weren’t. Okay, cool. I breathed a bit easier, but only temporarily.
The next time Dave woke up, he was no better. He could barely string a sentence together, except very simple phrases. Any time he tried to express anything complicated it made no sense. The wrong words were strung along with gibberish, and then he would turn to me and say, “Did you get that?” By then I was convinced that he’d had a stroke. I asked him if he could get dressed and he said yes, and slowly proceeded to do so. He still objected to going to “sit in a waiting room for eight hours”, but I insisted. I knew his stroke couldn’t be all that bad because he had done all these things— made breakfast, walked around, remembered a coffee date and got himself dressed. However, a stroke is a stroke and I wasn’t going to wait any longer. I drove him to the Royal Victoria Hospital and told the intake nurse what I thought had happened. They took him within five minutes, which was lucky because the waiting room was so full there wasn’t a free seat. It wasn’t long before he was hooked up to a heart monitoring machine to make sure his heart was okay, which it was. His blood sugar and blood pressure were also normal, so that was a relief.
After that we waited hours for a CT scan, then a bit more waiting until around midnight they told us officially that he’d had a stroke in his thalamus, in the left hemisphere. It was a mild stroke as these things go, but they were going to transfer him to the Neuro the next day.
In the end he spent six days at the Neuro being tested and analyzed, but when they found that he was physically in pretty good shape, they decided to send him home with me instead of being transferred to a rehab centre. Dave was happy to be home and I was glad to have him, although a bit nervous about what to expect. Was he at risk of falling? He didn’t seem too worried about it, and still put his underwear on while standing on one foot until I saw him do it and insisted he sit on the bed! No falls to report to date! Physically his challenges are minimal and now he has a routine given to him by a physical therapist that he’s been doing religiously, so I expect him to make a full recovery in that respect.
It’s Dave’s speech and short term memory that are most affected by the stroke, and yet he hasn’t seen a speech therapist to date. They’re at a premium these days, I guess, because though we’re on waiting lists, actual appointments are not to be had. The public system says it’ll be months before he’s seen and by that time, I’m assuming that with time and the exercises we’ve been doing he’ll practically be back to normal. The private system is almost as discouraging. The printed-out sheets we received from the speech therapist at the Neuro on his discharge have been a godsend. When Erica was here for a month, she was helping him almost every day, using the exercises on the sheets, and since she left, I’ve taken over. I can’t express how grateful I am for both my kids, who’ve been super supportive. Travis and Allison came to visit for several days shortly after the stroke, and were a huge emotional support. Travis also went to visit his Dad several times, and their dog, Hekate, kept Buster entertained, which made things a lot less stressful for me! Erica being here was a huge help and I miss her very much now that she’s gone back to her flat and husband and projects in London. (How dare she have her own life??!!)
As Dave continues to work diligently at his recovery on a daily basis, I’m not sure what to expect for the future. We’ve been told that every stroke is different, that there’s no predicting exactly how much Dave will improve. He doesn’t seem all that worried about it most of the time, and the depression that was predicted by several medical people hasn’t settled in yet, although he has his despondent moments that worry me. Yes, he gets frustrated when he can’t find a word, and sometimes gets impatient with me for not guessing what he’s saying, but on the whole he’s been remarkably content. Luckily, he’s retired so he doesn’t have the added pressure of having to go back to teaching in the fall. He has some conducting gigs coming up that he’d like to do, but we’ll see how he feels when the time approaches. I think he’ll be able to do it, but if he doesn’t feel confident, he can back out gracefully and give himself more time.
I’ve found it’s been like getting to know and read a new Dave, who is mostly calmer, less talkative, and more blunt. This can be good, because with fewer words available, it’s better (and easier) to be direct. On the other hand, his bluntness can be jarring and hurtful at times. Not often, but sometimes. He has less patience with Buster, often simply telling him to “Fuck off!” if he’s getting on his nerves. On the positive side, he’s expressed sincere gratitude to both Erica and I for the help we’ve been providing. It’s touching and comforting to know that he appreciates us.
I miss our long, easy conversations of an evening, and sometimes I mourn for the “before times”; before his “specialness”, as he once referred to it. (Erica immediately decided that’s what we’d call it from now on, so it’s become a standing joke.) I know things will improve, that he’ll be able to express complex thoughts more readily in the future, but our lack of conversation is odd right now. It’s weird being the one who has to instigate it and/or insist on continuing. He often starts, “I was thinking about…oh forget it”. or similar. I have to poke and prod him to make him continue, but eventually we understand each other. I used to think of myself as the quieter one, now our roles are reversed.
There have been many, many moments of shared hilarity during this process, which has made everything bearable. It’s hard not to find some of his errors funny. When asked to give examples of flowers, for instance, he once insisted that “hysterectomy” was a flower, to the point where I had to google it to make sure I wasn’t the crazy one! He once referred to my snoring (which is obviously not a thing, by the way) as “windsurfing”. He has a lot of trouble remembering his nieces’ names, (although recently he’s getting better). He used to get stuck after the eldest one, Jessica, so we’d say, the next one begins with “N” (Nicole), so once he suggested…Nnnn…Nebuchednezzar? I mean… COME on! that’s hilarious! The three of us couldn’t stop laughing.
Perhaps it’s best not to know what life has in store, just roll with it when it happens, and if possible, find the humour. Here’s a blessing for you: may all your curveballs be hittable.
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