Saturday, June 16, 2012

Neglected

From the National stroke Association website:"Have you seen your stroke survivor leave food on half of their plate? Forget to put their recovering arm into a shirt sleeve? Bump into the door jam with the left side of their wheelchair? Not turn their head in your direction when you speak? If you have noticed any of these things, you've very likely witnessed one-side neglect." Anyone who saw me early on in my recovery could have answered yes to most of those questions, I have what is referred to s Left Neglect and it has been one of the more challenging things to overcome. At first my doctors told my family and friends to interact with me on my left side, or they would hold Charlotte over there so I'd be forced to look to that side, my left neglect stilll haunts me. Part of my recovery process has been learning how to get around my left neglect, if I am having trouble finding something I have now learned that it's probably on my left side, you can basically hide things from me in plain sight simply by placing them to my left, I literally don't see them! it's like that side has disappeared,hence the title of my blog. Annie pointed out to me that most of my typing mistakes early on in the blog were on the left side of the screen, an excellent example of what I'm coping with. When Annie and I would work on something that was on a sheet of paper, my challenge was to make sure I was always looking all the way to the left side of the sheet, but this gets a little better everyday, I still run my arm into walls and doorways and sometimes I forget to wash the left side of my hair. But I am learning to let my left side shine and as a result it is slowly making itself known to me again.

1 comment:

  1. I'm still astounded by what you've been through during this process. It's very strange for me to try and imagine feeling that way, like one side of my body just isn't there--I cannot possibly say I understand what that feels like, but I definitely sympathize and send you all the good vibes in the world to keep doing what you need to do for you. You have such a great outlook--with this blog, you reveal that honest part of yourself, the part that rejoices with the successes and the part that admits to feeling scared and worried. I hope you feel that chronicling this has helped you in some small way. It's been an immense treasure to follow along in your journey. I wish you all the best. Sending love to you and your family.

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