Learning New Dance Steps After The Stroke!

Image/Dolor Photo Club

When you’ve been married for a long time you learn a few dance steps with your spouse. Having a stroke can lead to learning some new dance steps.

I am talking about the nuances of interactions with my wife; otherwise, I can’t dance.

Having a stroke they call an acquired brain injury changes the dance steps!

During the first month, almost anything could get me crying like a baby! Particularly when somebody did something nice.

The rules in the house were about to change my dear little wife was to become what I affectionately called (my keeper!) She became my caregiver faithfully visiting every day. So much so that I was worried she was to wear herself out. What that would mean is about an hour bus trip down in an hour back and she visited for a couple hours that was a four-hour chunk out of her day.

Fortunately, they kept me really busy. My yellow binder kept me on track as to my next appointment in the day, I carried that binder with me everywhere I went because my short-term memory was one of the things that was not quite up to snuff anymore!

I don’t know if you have ever been in a long-term relationship but after 38 years you have learned those dance steps and they work pretty well!

All of a sudden those dance steps are not working.  The little things that your spouse does ( you know that is just the way they are) start’s to really make you mad!

I could tell from the look on her face she was really bewildered and on my part doing the best to bite my tongue.   This just wasn’t working well!

You can’t do anything about it and fortunately after a little reassurance from the social worker another very important person on my Team that this was very normal.

Dorothy couldn’t do anything right and she could tell that look on my face she was making me madder and madder, she left thinking not quite sure what had she done to cause such anger.

On my part, I knew she was leaving not knowing what she had done to become the brunt of all this anger.

What you need to remember is if you have a family member that has gone through a stroke it is a brain injury and personalities will sometimes change and as things heal things might get but they might not get back to the way they were.

Please don’t take what the person is saying personally or how they’re reacting they probably can’t control their emotions I couldn’t.

There is a lot going on as the body heals and makes new now pathways to repair the damage.

Emotions on the ragged edge can be one of the side effects

When you’ve learned what I have learned while researching for this blog I have come to learn that the body is absolutely amazing as it tries to repair itself after a stroke.

I think the reference that we are” fearfully and wonderfully made” is not too far off the mark.

I am writing this post about 15 months out of the stroke things have gotten better and we have started to learn how to make those new dance steps work.

 I am grateful my wife’s patience and understanding and love.

My wife had made the comment after I was out of the hospital that “if all I could do was just my eyes she would’ve still been there for me.”

THAT IS REAL LOVE!

I’ve heard many stories the spouses who couldn’t take all the changes and left.

Takes a strong person to deal with all these changes.

Don’t judge someone that walks away remember you’re not walking in their shoes!

I think after this stroke we have come to love each other more than we did before.