Life After Stroke

The Stroke A Blow by Blow Account I am now 70 years old and doing well on my medications. As usual, I arrive early at work and start my list of things to do. Cleanup in the shop. Then, get on the computer in the office. However, while in the shop, I feel another brick wall fall on me. I begin to get forgetful. Can’t find my coffee cup where I usually keep it. My eyesight is off. I find it hard to walk without running into objects and door jambs. I finally make it to the office, set down in my chair in front of my computer I work on and turn it on. The computer comes on but it will not see the keyboard. I keep cycling the computer off and on, but no keyboard. About an hour later, the other guys begin to show up. I ignore them as they greet me. I keep working on the computer to get it to see the keyboard. My boss comes over to find out what’s going on, but I keep cycling the computer. I Ignore him as well. He keeps trying to get my attention by calling my name and asking what’s going on, but I keep ignoring him. He then grabs me and looks in my eyes. The next thing I hear is the boss calling 911 for an ambulance. Suddenly, the door to the office opens. Four men come in and grab the chair I am setting in. Each one is pulling the chair (it’s on casters) in a different direction. They talk to each other, but never say anything to me. At last, they get me off the chair, take me outside and strap me to a gurney. They roll the gurney into an ambulance and we are off, with lights and siren on. In a few minutes, we arrive at the hospital. The gurney is wheeled out of the ambulance and down a hallway. Next they wheel me into a room. I remember the doctors saying to relax as they put me under. I later find out that a piece of cholesterol had broken off a vessel wall and had blocked one of the arteries in my neck going to my brain. This cut off the blood supply to the brain, causing parts of the brain to die. This what is called a stroke. The doctors operate on my neck and remove the blockage. This restored the blood supply to the brain. But, by this time, the damage has been done to the brain. I was later told that if I had arrived 15 minutes later, I probably would not have made it.