As I was walking to my office from the center entrance where Bob dropped me off, I remembered a few of the side effects that I thought were funny even while I was experiencing them.

I always thought that the swing of the arms that matches the opposite leg while walking was natural & automatic. Post stroke, I realized that my left arm just hung pretty much straight down while my right arm swung in time with my left leg while walking. I thought it looked exceedingly silly, so I set out to fix it. I put a light weight (1 lb) in my left hand and walked around the block while purposefully swinging my left arm. I realized today that it now swings naturally on its own accord

Similarly, when I first started out walking on my own, I was heavily dependent on my right side since my left side was so weak. When walking up/down stairs, I gravitated toward the right side railing (which is handy enough in our society since that is the appropriate side to travel). When trying to incorporate using my left side for strengthening, I tried to use my left hand for railings. The problem with that is that I had to consciously grab the railing then think about each step with great purpose. As I moved forward, I forgot to release my left hand (again, 'normals' don't have to think about these things!). I looked pretty darn funny trying to move forward with my hand still gripping the railing. I almost ran into many a wall from this issue. Even funnier is that I had to stop moving to free up my thinking to release my hand and grip forward. I'm pretty sure I looked almost robotic "grip, step, step, release grip, regrip, step, step" over and over again. It takes A LOT of brain power to recover like that. I don't have to think about every single step any longer which is a huge relief.

Moving like I am losing the race with a snail made for some amusing activity that I would have loved to have seen from someone else's perspective. When I first went back to work, I was still using a quad cane (four footed cane) with, of course, my right hand since my left was mostly useless strength- & grace-wise. To get into the building at work closest to where my office was located, you had to hold up your badge, wait for the door to click, walk forward & open the door. *This* is how my attempts went:

Walk up to the badge station, let go of the cane, get my badge out of my purse, waive the badge in front of the badge box, stuff the badge back into my purse as I hear the door click, grab my cane, waddle forward, let go of the cane, reach for the door as the door clicked locked again. I did this easily half a dozen times unsuccessfully until either someone else walked up to help me or I called someone inside to help me in.

I would have loved to have seen that security footage of this fiasco. I couldn't get my left hand to hold onto the badge because it had no grip & it had no strength whatsoever so I couldn't depend on it for the cane. If it wasn't so pathetic to see, I would have expected to see people giggling uncontrollably at the ridiculous plight of me going back and forth desperately trying to beat the door click. It felt like a Saturday Night Live skit. :roflmao: