Zain:

3 months out of stroke is too early to tell is this all the improvements you are going to get, stroke recovery is long process, its marathon, recovery keeps on coming slowly but steadily, don't give up any hope at all, keep faith and be strong for your family and Farhaan.

Asha

Zain,

As asha has said stroke recovery is often very long. One good thing he has going for him is age. Usually the younger a person the better their recovery chances.

All stroke survivors have plateaus, times when progress seems to stop. In almost all cases this is not permanent. Progress does resume. It is as though the body takes a time out to rest before continuing to heal itself. Many on this network have been told by medical personnel that a plateau is permanent, it isn't. In the U.S. we also have the problem of insurance companies who are anxious to see a diagnosis of plateau so they can discontinue paying bills.

No one knows how much progress an individual will make. That depends are many variables. What you and he can both do at this point is continue to work towards improvement. No one knows what deficits he will be left with.

Good luck to all of you.

Zain,

I never got the chance to welcome you in your first post back in September. I remember reading about your 8 year old son.

He CAN move his hand much better, swallow much better and balance himself when sitting. For his age and the little time since his stroke, he is IMPROVING quite well. It takes time, I've been at it for almost 3 years now. I came home from a 4 month stay in hospital in a wheelchair then had to learn to walk with a cane.

Chances are good that your son will continue to improve, BUT, it does take TIME, lots of time even for the very young people.

I compare a stroke to an earthquake, it happens without warnings, doesn't last very long, but takes years to rebuild back to a liveable condition. Maybe not like before, but you are alive.

Depending on where in the brain is affected and how much damage is done in that short period of time, determines how long it will take to recover some of what you had before the stroke.

It is really too early to tell in less than 3 months, but he has already shown you he is improving slowly. He is a young survivor and will require some therapy in relearning to talk and walk. That's a must from my experiences.

I agree with every one else who has posted, 3 months is too early to predict where he will be in say a year or so. My fiance was not able to do half of what he can do now at three months. It has been a little over a year since his strokes but he has shown more improvement in the last six months than he ever did in the first 6 months. Give him time. He still has a long way to go and he's young. From everything I have ever read children do so much better in recovery than even adults of a young age. I would think that this is due to there resilience and the brian being young and more able to rewire itself.

Tina

No way his improvement has stopped! You just have to get in there with a big smile and show him that you'll help him keep working at it.

You have a lot of people here wishing you courage and energy.

T

Don't give up! My husband's progress was not constant. He would show great improvement, then level off, then improve, then level off. His doctor told us it was often like that for stroke survivors. He said to think of the plateaus as the body gearing up for the next big jump in recovery.