Stuff Happens, Life Goes On

LIFE WITH A STROKE SURVIVOR

Rog and I had been married 16 ½ years. We had our ups and downs and times when I thought we wouldn’t last.  He was a hardworking man and a good father.  He worked 60 hour weeks at the machine shop making ball screws, then spent weekends helping our daughters with their cheerleading  He was a pretty good cook and made dinner on the days I went to school.  He would always let me check my steak to be sure it was done enough before he turned off the barbeque.  He was always doing something in the garage or the garden or putting things together or fixing them.  He was a machinist and he loved his job. He loved tools and it seemed like most of his paycheck went for paying for tools.

When he changed employers he took his retirement money from the company and bought a  I was furious!!! We had enough money troubles, but instead of paying off some bills, he bought a $1000 swimming pool! He and the kids loved the pool.  Every year he set it up, took it down and maintained it daily.  In protest, I had nothing to do with the pool.  I never went in it and never did anything to help with it.  In fact, I never did anything to help with the yards at all.  I didn’t even know what my back yard looked like!

It was on a Saturday, March 8, 2003, when we were getting ready to attend a major cheerleading competition. My daughter Julia was the coach and Jackie was on her team.  Rog was in the garage having his usual black coffee, cigarette breakfast. He came into the house and told me he had a pain starting in his chest and running down his arm.  When he agreed to let me take him to the hospital emergency room, I began to worry, but I thought it would be alright.  We’ll go to the hospital, they’ll give him something to make him fart, and we’ll be on our way to the competition.  We told the girls we’d be a little late, but we’d meet them at the competition shortly, as soon as Rog was out of the Emergency Room.

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It turned out to be an aortic aneurysm, which means the main artery to his brain was about to burst and he would die. If this had happened a day earlier when he was at work, he would have waited until the end of his shift before he went to the hospital and he would have died.  We did not meet the girls at the cheerleading competition later that day.  Rog was taken by ambulance to another hospital with an extensive cardiovascular department to undergo an emergency surgery the next morning.  During the surgery he suffered four strokes and remained in the hospital for six weeks.  He couldn’t speak, he didn’t know his name, he literally cried because he thought I had left him, even though I came to see him every day.

Of the three hospital choices I had, I chose the closest to the school where I worked. I don’t know how I made that decision; I can’t account for my reasoning at the time, but it was the right one.  Every day after work, I went to see Rog, feed him his dinner, take him for walks in a wheelchair and get him ready for bed.  Once I finally got home at night after spending the day with 150 teenagers and their attitudes, and then going to see my suddenly disabled husband, I was exhausted.  I was told by the doctors not to take any days off from work because I would need all the days I could get to take care of Rog whenever he would be discharged and allowed to come home.  Finally at about 11 p.m. every night I sat in the living room and ate dinner and watched TV before I went to bed, only to get up the next morning and do it all over again. Every night I looked at his empty chair and prayed, “Please Lord, let Rog come home and sit in his chair and say something stupid.”

All of a sudden I became the “man of the house.” I did not want this job, nor was I qualified to do it.  My “work around the clock, do everything” husband now had to be cared for like an infant.  I had to do all the things he did and more.  You guessed it.  I assemble and maintain the swimming pool as it’s been a form of therapy for him (not to mention the grands have fun in it).  It’s been 13 years and I’m so happy to tell you that Rog has come a long, way.  Since this blog is about being grandparents, I’ll be telling you a lot of stories about Rog and his comeback from this near-death experience.  He does a lot now.  Sometimes it’s just like it was before he got sick and other times it’s like WHAT???? There doesn’t seem to be any rhyme or reason to what he can and can’t do.  Although he’s made a miraculous recovery, he still has some permanent disabilities that will never change.

Rog can’t work or drive or follow directions or write or read or count or cook or dial a phone or use a computer. He lost his peripheral vision and the vision he has left is impaired so that he sees duplicates of things and it looks like things are charging at him. His brain often tells him there is pain, where there is nothing physically wrong; therefore, there is no cure for the pain.

Our whole family has had to make adjustments, but he’s the best husband, father and grandpa I could ever ask for. We’re back to our usual routine of sitting down to dinner in front of the TV and watching reruns every night.  He has his beer and brings me my wine – yeah that’s right.  We have new chairs now and every night he sits in his chair and says something stupid.  And I say, “Thank you, Lord!”

Please share your challenges and situations with us and give us your advice.  We look forward to hearing from you!

debbie@grammyslittlehelpers.com