Weekend in the Hospital
Inside and Outside
by Terry Light
Most of
my weekend in the hospital was the same ol’ same ol’ as the rest
of the week, but there were differences and I had a big decision to
make.
So that you know, my stroke hit me in the lower back of the brain in what are known as the “midbrain” and “thalamus” regions. I don’t know how that affected me or what the different levels of stroke are like.
Nowadays, when I ask my neurologist if I really had a
bad stroke, he looks at me like I just asked the silliest thing in the
world, and says, “You were paralyzed!
You could only move on one side!”
Did that tell me the answer?
I was pretty sure he meant, “Yes.”
I recovered some functions more quickly than he and others expected. My doctors continue to be amazed and say that I am blessed.
Sometimes I try to figure out what was different,
because I find myself unable to credit other (stars, sports heroes,
doctors) with “miraculous” recoveries from stroke.
When those people return to work as if nothing ever happened, I
tend to discount what they are saying.
Some of that is probably wrong. Maybe they are just as messed up on the inside as I am. Perhaps they just "fool" people the way I do when I say I am "faking it."
This is because I know how I feel inside versus how I look outside. There is a difference. In the beginning, I didn’t know what I looked like on the outside. That is why I write much of this narrative as “just another day.” I forget what I was really like.
Some days, I wish I could return to my old job, being
a self-employed internet guru.
It was fun. Instead,
I am doing this in the hopes that someone – anyone – will know they are
not alone.
© 2009 by T. J. Light