• A  blog is a personal journal of your daily life as a stroke survivor or stroke caregiver.  Surprisingly, countless members have called it therapeautic to write down their thoughts and to vent their frustrations.  You can make it private, just for your eyes or public and share your personal thoughts with your friends.  Why not try it, create your blog and start writing and see if it helps you.  

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  • swilkinson

    Living on angel time.

    By swilkinson

    I went to see the neurosurgeon on Tuesday. I was interviewed by a young Asian associate doctor and sent for a 3D MRI and angiogram, a brand new way of showing  the blood supply within the brain. The results were given to me by the associate and then I saw the specialist. It appears the aneurysm is larger and deeper than previously thought but at my age they are not going to operate as it would mean a full brain surgery. Coiling, one method of dealing with an aneurysm, is not an option. I think I
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    • 2,467 views

Jersey found :)

Well it was not my fault. My Daughter found her Jersey, it was thrown in her room with all the other junk. I feel a lot better I usually am at fault , but this time it was not, I feel 100% better knowing it was not my fault.

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Monday clean out

Today, I experienced a bowel clean out...diarrhea. No explanation, no real reason why, no new meds or anything, the only thing I can think is my body is ridding itself of any remaining bugs from the flu I had this past week. anyway, what a mess, and it's good to have that gone!! Sorry so gross. Now, I'm ready for a valentine day.

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Kids

It was great to see my daughter this weekend. Liz and I took her to Sam's Club to buy her supplies. This was done as a purely defensive measure. That kept her from "Shopping at Dad's".   We got there at the insane hour of 9:00am. Most days, Sam's has what they call Business Hours where they are open for those who are lucky enough to have Business Memberships. Today was not that day.   What it did do was give us some time together without the hustle and bustle that normally comes with

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Valentine's For All

COMFORT IS....   What brings comfort to me??   The beauty of the city lights from the top of the hill late at night   The silence of nighttime   The purring of my cats   Giving and sharing my heart with friends   My apartment where I make my home   Knowing I'm needed and that others are glad to see you   A shoulder to cry on when things are all wrong   A hand that will hold mine loneliness sets in   My fishtanks as they make that bubbling sound   And knowing that

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FUNCTION

Why do I define who I am by my function in life? How can I redefine in my mind who I am by who I am rather than what I can do? How can I feel wanted? I feel unnecessary, in the way and a cause of more work for those around me. I don't 'pull my own weight' anymore.  

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Valentines Day Presents

Today is sunday the 13 th of February. The day before Valentines day. The day before romance and presents, a day made popular by the greeting card industry. A day to celebrate with presents according to my 7 year old daughter, Alex. She dragged her father to the florist yesterday, made him spend money. Bless her little heart I got 3 long stem red roses, a heart shaped helium balloon and a Whitmans sampler heart shaped box of chocolates. I opened it up( of course) and gave her the honor of having

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No Celebration without the suffering.....

When I woke up this morning, I was thinking of taking the easy way or the hard way. Now ever since I was a kid, I have never done anything the easy way. I have a nature that is stubborn and strong willed. I know by being this way, I have made some things harder on myself. But upon reflection I don't think it has hindered or harmed me in any way.   As a teen that had snuck out of the house to go joyriding with friends and I did partake in the 2 liter bottle of 7-UP mixed with a bottle of Sou

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No Jersey yet.:)

I still have not found my daughters jersey, but no problem she played any way not that she wasn't but just to look as part of her team I am really stumped I have no idea where its at . I am going crazy thinking what I did with it and where I have put it, this is really a good one. now they are 4 and 0. A cold day turned out to be a hot day for a very hot team I am very proud of my Daughter can you tell she made about 4-5 baskets . It was almost a shut out final score was 24-1

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Taxes

Somehow, I got conned into doing my daughter's taxes. I am still trying to figure out how this happened.   The neat thing is hers was very simple compared to mine and Liz's. I already had the software to do the Federal and State of Michigan. However, she did a fool thing like move to Pennsylvania. So I had to go to the State of Pennsylvania web site and download the PA State Form and do it the "old fashioned way".   If she had to choose a state to move to that has income taxes, Pennsyl

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Cold day

Today has been a preety cold day a cold day for us here in Ca is about 60 degrees got up this morning started looking for my Daughters Basketball jersey cant find it any where , she has a game today I know I put it away but cant seem to find it. or remember. where I placed it   I thought I hung it up in the closet downstairs but its not there I will have to call her Coach and see if she can use another one for today. (JMIA) Jersey Missing In Action. So far her team is 3 and 0 they h

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Revenge maybe.....

There was something interesting in the mail today.   It was a letter from the Cleveland Clinic Foundation. They want to learn about my experience at their outpatient clinic and use it to help them improve their services.   As you may recall, our super hero was not that impressed with the Cleveland Clinic (especially after Dr. FeelGood did not send a copy of his report to my neurologist who I specifically requested).     If you get the idea from the emotions above that I plan to

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Almost human again

I've been sleeping most of the past 2 days and I'm finally almost feel human again. I had the flu shot back in November. So, if I remember next fall, I won't take the flu shot. It's a waste of time and $.

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annoying barking dogs

before all of the dog lovers in the world get upset, let me say that this story ends happily.     BARKING DOGS!!!!!! when i first moved into my quiet little neighborhood nearly ten years ago, the people living on either side of me were "cat people". after a couple of years a family moved in on the east side next door with FIVE DOGS. right after THAT, a single woman moved in to the west next door with one cocker spaniel that was a REAL barker and to top it off, she rarely was home and paid

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Support Group

I went to my support group this morning and we did lots of talking about the % of having another Stroke. We all came to the same conclusion that if a survivor takes care of him/herself it would be a low percentage. Eating the right foods and Keeping away from you bad habits, Smoking / Drinking the percemntage rate would be low . Then we made some nice Valentine gifts for our Caregiver / Spouse. oh yea I won a T- shirt for getting the most answers on a crossword puzzle

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My life is a horror film

I feel like my life is a horror film in progress. Just when you think you're safe Jason shows up with his hockey mask on. I'm in a whining mood today, I feel like crap. I ache all over, my sides hurt from coughing. I truly hope I'm not sharing my flu with my family. That would be awlful.

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NEVER take a personality test!!!!!!!!!!!

i took a "personality" test online. after i finished i was reading the results. ..."loyal, very likable, humorous( hey, i LIKE this test!!!), honest, etc....   THEN, the final analysis...." while this test does not take the place of the opinion of a licensed therapist, our results reveal that you appear to have a PARANOID PERSONALITY DISORDER AND SHOULD SEEK IMMEDIATE THERAPY FOR THIS..."     ME? PARANOID!!!!! i just sat back and took a LONG hard look at myself. let me see, i wouldn't l

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All roads lead somewhere right?

It never fails to amaze me how much my mental outlook and attitude can change so dramatically in just 24 hours. I guess one of my biggest complaints is since my stroke there seems to be little if any balance to my feeling, emotions my outlook the way I view the world around me, and how I feel inside. Yesterday started rather badly but by early mid morning things were sailing along everything going my way. No cross circuit burnout in my brain, no simple misunderstandings that at the time seem lik

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Trying again

I may have lost a number of things due to the stroke but not my stubborn streak. I lost an entry to my blog earlier today, here I am 10pm trying again. Im sure it would have been something simple.   What I do is keep going until I'm too tired and then I make mistakes. I'll just try to mail this as a draft so I can come back to it. Please don't fail again.   Good it was OK this time. Time for bed, try again tomorrow.    

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Need to quicken up

Tony is on 4 weeks annual leave, it is so nice having him home. Tomorrow we are going into Frankston to do some shopping... haven't done that for some time. Last time he took holidays was when I came home from hospital, quite different to now.   Tony drove me to Melbourne last Sunday to meet Lin from StrokeNet and her sister, we spent 3 or 4 hours together, had a nice lunch by the Yarra River, then went on a short river cruise which was a first for Tony and I. Think we were all tired by th

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Let the sun shine in

You know it really is amazing what blue skies and bright sunlight can do for a depressed soul. I figure it must be the radiation toasting what brain cells I have left by what the hell mel let the good times roll. Ya you got it right I'm having one of the very very rare good feeling days. Of course the first thing I try to do is anyalyze why I'm feeling so good so I can duplicate the feeling in the future but today I actually used what commen sense I have left and said to myself hey Leroy go wit

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Be careful what you ask for!!!!!!!

Good morning all.   As some of you are aware, I decided to go to the Cleveland Clinic. I had gathered up all of the doctor notes and records anc copies of the various X-Rays, MRI, MRA, and CT-Scans I have received since November 2004.   The doctor I went to at Cleveland Clinic looked over all of my records, looked over the various films, and said the following, "You did NOT have a stroke. You had a migraine headache."   I did some looking online for headaches and found there is a very

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Today started awful....

ok, today started out pretty bad. I was laying on my back, mouth open, snoring away happily when I got tag teamed. "The boys" decided mom had slept long enough. "The Boys" consist of one bad seed Pomeranian and two cats. The cats had an ulterior motive, they wanted to be fed. The Pom was just being him. He was gently licking my eyelids with that cold nose and slobby tongue. The tongue I belatedly remembered had been happily licking the guts of a dead rodent the day before or the yellow labs pr

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Going Postal

"Going Postal" is a new modern catchphrase that brings different images to mind that are as varied as the people thinking of what that phrase really means. Do you picture some snot nosed youth with pimply skin and greasy hair coming to work with a gun and blowing everyone away because he's *beep* at a co worker and if you're in the wrong place at the wrong time, you could be lucky enough to be sprayed with bullets too? No? That is Columbine High school, not the post office. The post office just

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