Hope. This is something I've thought long and hard on for the last 5 years. If I'm in a cynical mood, hope is nothing more then a fleeting thought in the world of stroke recovery, kind of the same thing as hoping your numbers come up in the powerball. After all hope 's defintion is " the desire or expectation of obtaining something" I've hoped for 5 years that I will recover almost everything I lost in the stroke. But there lies the problem of hoping.... I don't know why I never noticed it before.... that huge flaw in whatever remaining logic, I as a female with brain damage can have.

First off, I lost many things in the stroke that I don't want to get back.

1) living a meaningless shallow life, on the fast track to aquiring huge debt and material possessions.

2) Never taking the time to appreciate the simple things in life.

3) forcing myself to conform but secretly unhappy over doing so.

4) Wasting my brain power on lack of use.

5) Never living each day to the fullest.

6) A poor choice in a spouse.

7) Being apathetic and just existing.

8) Acquaintances who showed themselves not to be real friends.

9) Having to work a full time job and my identity wrapped up in a job title.

10) Being responsible for the care and expense of upkeep on a car.

11) Constantly being productive.

Whew! That was a hard list to complete. Now that I have brought myself back to reality I hope to continue regaining use of my left hand and arm. I think that is a more reasonable desire to achieve instead of being so broad and general in my goals. After all I don't want to buy into false hope because in my observations false hope borders on denial at times. But these are my potholes of life I try to avoid and it is my back door way of accepting life as I know it today.

Yin

PS. Besides the things I listed, no one could pay me to take them back, they are unwanted rubbish in the sea of life. Things I am much better off without and a better way to see that there are positive sides to stroke.