Not Something I Remember

My husband took this picture September 20, 2005. I don't remember it. I was in a coma lying there in this picture. I'm glad I don't remember this picture being taken. This is what happens sometimes when you have a stroke after having a brain tumor removed. I remember the constant pain though those first couple of weeks-Lordy I wish I didn't remember that either! I was 33 years old at the time. Active, vibrant, full of laughter, full of life. When I realized what happened, which actually wasn't till days later, I wished I was dead. I woke up to confusion, pain, & the inability to move my entire left side-I just didn't realize that at first. People that suffer from strokes tend to over look the fact that they can't move one side of their body, and boy did I overlook a great deal the first couple of days! Until I tried to really do something on my own. Then what they told me started to sink in: I HAD A STROKE. I think at the time I was still on so many drugs though that the full implication of it was not getting through to me. I knew what a stroke was, I knew I couldn't move, but I didn't believe that ME, that I had it. Naaaaaaaaaah, that was someone else. I would get better I just knew it. The first brain tumor operation in 94 made me weak & I was in bed for almost a week before I could move so this one couldn't be any different. That was the bacterial meningitis & the high fevers talking through me there. I was clueless. I kept thinking that given more time, I would snap out if it! It wasn't till I was moved to Sea Pines & I was completely off the heavy stuff by the first full day there, that a tech said: nope girlie, you're paralyzed & from the looks of it, it could be forever. When the doctor came in that morning for an evaluation with me, he knew he couldn't pull the wool over my eyes or hide the truth from me. he said that it would be a hard process but that I was young & could get it back-somewhat if I really tried. But that he didn't know when or how long it would take, or if I ever would really get out of a wheelchair. He said that I was so weak on the left side that my leg muscles had already started atrophiing in 3 weeks time. That really sucked to hear. At least he didn't sugar coat it with me. That is something I would never respect from a doctor, a lie or sugar coating. I work in the medical field so it's not an easy thing to accomplish in my opinion. It's been 1 year, 4 months, & 12 days since my stroke. Most of my hair has grown back on the right side. I can walk, badly, but I do it. I trip a lot & my left leg has a mind of it's own at times. My foot turns under & doesn't support me correctly damnit. My arm tends to shake like a palsied cheese grater on crack and I can barely lift my left arm over my head. I can open & close my hand but I can't tie laces or open cracker packets or pick coins up. At least I no longer wish I was dead and I only cry to myself in a pity party of frustration maybe two times a week instead four to five times a day like Iused to at first in sheer depression. Let's see where I'm at by my strokeversary year #2. I have some hope deep down inside.