Stroke

For those of you that know me, you know that I’ve recently had a TIA. What is a TIA you ask? It’s a Transient Ischemic Attack. Still lost? LOL, don’t worry I was too. In layman’s terms it’s a mini stroke.

On June 28th I decided at 10pm that I needed to go to Walmart and get a few things. By nature I’m nocturnal but normally I would have waited for my daughter to get home from work and go then, or would have asked her to stop off at Walmart for me on her way home.
For some reason I did neither of those things. While I’m known for my spontaneity it’s not in my character to drag my kids out that late at night. While it is summer and they were all up…which that in it’s self is odd. Usually one or two are asleep by then…….anyway…..I told the kids to get ready to go. I knew Liz was getting off of work soon so I called her and told her we were going to Walmart, and asked if she would like for us to wait for her. Normally she would have said no she was tired. This time she said sure.

So it’s 10:30 at night by this time. We are all in the van waiting for her. She pulls in and hops into the passenger seat. Something else that is odd. I always have her drive at night because I’m night blind. But not this time.

We get to Walmart and were looking around. All of a sudden I got super hot and super grumpy. I just NEEDED to get out of there. We hurried up and got our items and checked out.
Once again I get into the drivers seat. We leave and are on the hwy home. That’s when it all happened. I felt my entire face go numb…I was thinking how odd, but I was still really grumpy so I pushed it aside. I went to set the cruise control which I’ve done a thousand times. I couldn’t figure out how to set it. I had no memory what to do. Liz asked me what was wrong and I told her I couldn’t remember how to set the cruise control. I don’t remember if I ever set it or not. So we get onto our gravel road and the outside window got some condensation on it. I for the life of me couldn’t figure out how to make it go away so I could see.

Liz, tells me to turn on the wipers and just like magic I can see again. By this time I’ve got blurry vision in my right eye. Yes, I’m still driving. I told Liz I wasn’t feeling the best and she asked me if I was having a stroke. I told her no very harshly even though by this time I was beginning to wonder.
Never once did it occur to me to pull over and have Liz take over driving.

We finally made it home and all in once place. I’m feeling confused and crabby. I knew something wasn’t right. I didn’t want to go to the ER for them to tell me it was all in my head and I couldn’t afford a ER bill as it was.

I told Liz to look up signs of stroke even though I knew the signs, I needed to see it with my eyes. As the time goes by and it was probably only a few minutes I’m feeling more and more confused and my entire face was completely numb.
Liz wasn’t get results fast enough for me so I googled the site WebMd. It’s a site I’ve used many times and recommended to lots of people but I couldn’t remember what it was called. Finally got to the site and put in my symptoms. I kept seeing Stroke, Stroke, Stroke, Stroke, I got that feeling in the pit in my stomach. I just knew I was having a stroke. Heck I’ve had training in what to do to help a stroke victim. But when your going through it, what you’ve learned goes out the window.

I told Liz that I thought we better go to the ER. So back to the van with girls in tow. By this time I was having problems walking. I remember Liz asking me if I needed help walking and I snapped at her and said no. Then boom, I couldn’t figure out how to take the next step. She had to walk me to the car. I’m terrified by this time. I know something is horribly wrong. I was trying to be brave and strong for the kids. I didn’t want them to see me this way.

I don’t remember the ride to the hospital. We get there and I was determined to walk in under my own accord. I know before we reached the desk the lady stood up and said “can I help you?”. I replied with I don’t feel so good. I don’t remember getting to the room. I don’t know if I told the girls to wait in the waiting room or Liz did. We get to the room and I’m crying. I have no idea why. I sit on the bed and they ask me my name. I could hear my name in my head but I couldn’t remember how to say it. I looked at Liz and she started giving them my info. After that I don’t remember anything until I came out of it.
The rest of what I will tell you will be what Liz has told me and the nurses in the ER.

Liz told me that when I looked at her I looked very overwhelmed. Thank the Goddess she knows my info.

Nurses told me my heart rate was 145 when I came in and my blood pressure was through the roof. I can’t remember who told me I got an EKG but I got one of them too.

They did a CT scan and a chest xray. So the stroke earned me a night in the hospital. I had bruises all over my right arm and no memory of how they got there. I had no memory of being hooked up to the heart monitor or the oxygen. I remember at one point and time I felt like I had a ton of people in my face. Liz said several were working on me. I can’t even type that without tearing up. How scared she must have been seeing me in that position.

I didn’t sleep at all while in the hospital so when the doc came in, I did my very best to act like I was normal. I wanted OUT! They ran some more blood work and did some sort of test on my next to see if anything was clogged. It was like an ultrasound but on my neck.

For the first week I was having major issues with confusion but each day I seemed to get a little bit better.

I had an ECHO done a week ago. Still no results from that.

My doctors theory is this….My heart was beating so fast it got tired and some how I got a clot, causing the mini stroke. He thinks I have bacteria on my heart valve which would explain the high white cell count I’ve had for the last year and my heart pumping so fast.

Unfortunately I’m not doing a whole lot better. I keep having the numbness on the left side. It does always goes away and doesn’t stay to terribly wrong.. I’m having balance issues and I keep losing track of what I am talking about and searching for words that are part of my normal vocabulary. I am so tired it’s unreal. I get worn out super fast. Just taking a shower wears me out and I have to sit down for a bit before I can even brush my teeth.

I’m going to be 40 on Monday and I’m way to young for this. It has me thinking about what if I do die, about my kids. I’m going to get a living will. I am also going to plan my own funeral. Is it a bit morbid, maybe. But I want to make things easier for my kids if I were to go. In spite of sounding morbid just now I am not dwelling on death and I AM thinking positive. Things will be ok and I will have a full recovery.

So, I’ve written a mini novel. If you’ve made it this far thank you for taking the time.
This took me over an hour to write. I had to keep going back and fixing things. Sighs…so if I’ve still left words out or didn’t make sense in some of them just ignore it. LOL

My blog here is just a back up blog. While I do upload most of my blogs to this site I have a blog on my own site www.prettyinpinkpixels.com/blog that is my main blog. :)