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A blog by Guest in General

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About this blog

what's playing in my head right now.

Entries in this blog

Fun with Jayden, Colby and Molly (the shih tzu)

I just got home yesterday having spent a week with my granddaughters. We went school shopping, played board games, played "cane hockey", and played with Molly. We finished the week off by making Apple bread and peach bread. Mason wasn't there of course but since I'm showing off my grandbabies, I'll include him too!  
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Feet Don't Fail me now!

Yesterday the home health care nurse came and discharged me from home health care, including home PT. They are having me continue with outpatient PT. I'm ready! I can walk better, farther and stronger than I have in two years. Starting tomorrow I'll be visiting my grand daughters, who I haven't seen since before all this started. I'm excited and they are too. I start therapy when I get back home.
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Better Every Day

After the initial improvements resulting from blood and Oxygen getting to my legs, I am having rapid improvement in lower extremity strength. Each day I can do something that I couldn't do the day before and more and more my gait looks like that of an adult, rather than a clumsy toddler. It is still alot of work and wipes me out but it is rewarding to see. It's not all peaches and cream but it doesn't have to be. I'm just glad to see forward movement at all. It's been a long time. I had my fo
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The Worst Part About Needing Help...

It's been another great day with huge strides I have made and I am sitting here in tears. Why, you may ask. I have good and caring friends, and I'm very grateful that they care enough to WANT to help me. I feel so sad if I hurt their feelings, and I've gotten better at restraint but today I came about 2 seconds from telling one of them off in terms that wouldn't be misunderstood. Yesterday was an amazing day. A friend took me grocery shopping. I need help to go down the huge cement steps in
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The Big Picture

For the past two years and especially the past year I've been like the princess and the pea. The lack of blood in my lower extremities changed sensation so that anything that touched me from the waist down didn't feel like what it was. A mere wrinkle in the bed sheets felt like my leg was resting on a piece of lumber. This could result in anything from severe discomfort to extreme pain and the doctor warned me that once blood carried oxygen to my extremities that would bring its own painful s
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Home Again

I got home today around 4 PM. Tomorrow a home health nurse comes and then Friday a physical therapist. They arranged it so one of them would be here Monday through Friday. My aunt is taking me tomorrow to fill the many new prescriptions I've been given. I'm exhausted and weak as a kitten but the doctors keep trying to drill it into my head that things didn't get this way over night and won't get better over night and weakness is to be expected. So tomorrow starts the next phase of this jour
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Second place in a dance competition!

If you're not buying it, don't worry...nobody else will either! I'm a notoriously bad dancer even before stroke but this morning in OT we had a dance competition using a Wii console. We sat in our chairs and did the arm movement with our arms and the hand controller registered our movements. I was in first place for the longest time until some guy stole my lead. Still, second is cool with me. Lol The whole time I was thinking how this would be a fun way to get exercise and to spends fun tim
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moving to rehab

The physical therapist recommended I be sent to acute rehab. She wants me to be a little more steady on my feet before I go home. So I am being transported there today for maybe a week.
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surgery is complete and was a success

I went into surgery yesterday. It was a success and there are strong pulses in each leg and foot. Still have some recovery and rehab to do to bring my walking back up to par. Have and will continue to have some mild nerve damage for being oxygen deprived for so long
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still waiting

I have tried and can't seem to comment to my own blog from my phone. I'm still waiting for surgery. There were some bad accidents and people needed emergency attention so I was bumped. They're trying to get me in soon as they can.   The blockage is a blood clot in the Aorta where it branches in the abdomen to supply the legs with blood.   This phone is a pain to post from so I'm going to cut this short. I will try to update again after surgery.
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A silver lining hiding in a dark cloud

I am in University of Maryland hospital again. I went to Walmart Friday with my mother and had trouble walking into the store. By Monday I couldn't walk at all. So I went to my local hospital who transported me to University of Md. They found no pulse in my legs and feet from the waist down. I am scheduled for surgery tomorrow for an arterial bypass to allow blood to flow into my legs again. Good news is that my walking should improve again. The pain in my feet should improve. During my e
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Small goals paying off

It hasn't been easy, or quick and the realization of each small goal didn't always bring excitement or even much notice but maybe I can finally see them coming together to bring a bigger payoff. I still have a few obstacles to work out but they no longer seem insurmountable.   I have some utterly shocking news to share with you. This has been one rough winter! See? I bet you would have never known that if I hadn't told you. In a more dramatic way I can say that I'm coming out of an almost
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Every little thing

We finally had a few days when the weather was good enough that the men could finish the roof. It's all done. No rain and snow inside, no cold air blowing in and no birds in my room! lol Dad still gripes about the weather but I just remind him that the worst of it is outside where it belongs. I feel much better having that problem solved.   I have some friends who live across the street who really enjoy my cooking and baking. They're craving Key Lime Pie. I make enough for them to free
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It's been a while...

My participation on the site has been less and less and nearly non existent in blogs. A lot has gone on since I last blogged and I've been busy trying to keep up and keep sane!   Our roof has been leaking for three years. Of course over those three years it steadily got worse and Dad and Aunt (owners of house) wouldn't fix it. So, finally the rain soaked ceiling in my bedroom fell on my head. I was fine--but with the ceiling gone there was nothing to stop the rain and I had to wear rain ge
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Broken toys and Broken dreams

Here's a newsflash-- things change. Things really do change and as it has been said, we have to change with them. Change--that's one thing that as humans we just don't like and we can be really good at resisting it! We often find what works for us and we are bound and determined to stick with it even when faced with evidence that something has changed and it is no longer working. That happened to me and as I read posts recently by other survivors like Fred and Leah and others, I see I'm not
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The things you notice when you're paying attention

My heart is so weak the fatigue is unbearable but for the past week I noticed I don't feel too bad. I have strong days and weak days but at least it's a step in the right direction. I decided I'm just going to run with it! My mother got a little shih tzu who has decided I'm her human. mom thinks it's funny especially since my step father doesn't! She lays at my feet and if he calls her she looks up at me as if asking permission to go to him. Mom told my brother about it and he wants me to
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Some test results are in

When I had my heart attack a year ago, it was discovered my left carotid artery was 100% occluded but my right was clear and blood was traveling through it to my brain. Since the bypass surgery that I needed on my heart was so risky the doctor decided that it would be better to leave that be and just watch the right one...and only do surgery if that side started to become blocked. A dopler ultrasound was done with the strong suspicion that it would show the need for surgery but instead we were
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Rollercoaster Kind of Day

I blogged not long ago about enrolling in our County disabled transportation program. Today I used it for the first time. I never really intended to use it too often but I really needed a back-up for those trips Aunt Sis either couldn't or wouldn't take. Aunt Sis, like me, is NOT a morning person, so I knew the second I heard "The doctor can see you at 8 am" that Aunt Sis wouldn't be going. So I scheduled the bus. It actually worked out great.   This was an initial visit so when the receptio
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lessons for being human

I remember the first time I read this. It's one of those tongue-in-cheek things that also holds a good deal of truth. Anyway, I got to thinking about it again and am basically "talking to myself" but if you're as bored or as lonely as I am at the moment, you're welcome to eavesdrop.   1. You will receive a body. You may like it or hate it, but it's yours to keep for the entire period.   This reminds me of another rule that says we can never have all the answers and if we eve
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7

Imperfect Timing

I really have nothing to complain about. My laptop was seven years old and I definitely put that poor thing through the wringer. So when it died this week, it owed me nothing. But I did get a new laptop which is very nice. Remember I just said I have nothing to complain about? The touch/mouse pad is driving me insane. lol I start moving the cursor the direction I want it to go and it totally disappears off the opposite edge off the screen, which normally wouldn't be a huge problem except this
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New Survivors--Taking Stock

I often say that I'm NOT useless, I can be used as a bad example! So, here we go!   I struggled a lot longer than the year everyone talks about that things get better. In a lot of ways, I was just getting revved up at the year mark. I realized that I did what a lot of survivors do and I really wasn't doing myself any favors.   We all want back as much as possible of the life stroke took from us. We hear so much about positive attitude and never giving up and determination that I think w
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11

Cheney

Just a flash of memory but beside the door in our house is a photo. A photo of my great grand father with deformed arms and hands. Eventually his legs were too but I was too young to see that because he was put in a nursing home and my family wouldn't let me see him. I remember that smile though....never saw him without it. I thought he didn't know my name because he only called me "Honey".   I'm sure there was a lot of loss but no one ever mentioned it--certainly not him. He just smiled
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Positive Attitude

There is no better time to see someone's positive attitude than when everything is going wrong. A positive attitude does not mean to be gleeful that something bad happened. It means to know that life still exists and we will go on in spite of our circumstances. It means to know your tragedy, it's stumbling blocks and pitfalls and to know you can side-step them and have prepared to survive them when you cross them.   I will not waste my time on asking why nor laying blame--not on Doctors, God,
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You Can't Get There From Here

It seems that way sometimes but as I've said before all the things I thought I knew I'm learning again. I love to learn. I just don't like the situations I find myself in that make learning necessary. Learning just for fun is more, well,...fun!   I was told emphatically a long time ago that basically, "You can't Get There From Here". It looked like they might be right. Everyone gave up on me and started making plans for me to be able to live "more comfortably" where I was, because while wher
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Yay! Finally on my way!

Like a lot of survivors, lack of independence has really kept me down. I don't drive. Some my fault and some not. I'm right side effected and I could drive with switching of the gas pedal and brake but I have vision cuts too. Theoretically, my cuts might not be enough to keep me from driving since I can't see my lap and hopefully no other cars want to drive on that but I refuse to drive with partial vision...I won't risk hurting someone else.   I live with my father as some of you know, in
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