Stroke stories - At Home

To be honest I wasn't going to do one on being home.

Mostly because being at home is BORING!

But it part of the process.  Trying to find some kind of normal again.  Simply trying to find some kind of comfortable position.  Sitting, standing and lying down are all uncomfortable for one reason or another.

I think I wanted to avoid it because it's also uncomfortable mentally.  I have to go back to where "it" happened.  There was a certain fear and trepidation when I first went back into my office at home and sat down in front of the computer.  There, in that chair, facing that monitor.  And nothing happened.  It's a desk in a room with a computer.

In those moments I think a little more of me healed.

Home heals me in other ways.  I can catch up with the world a little bit.  I came home to a stack of get well cards from family and friends.  It was a wonderful gift.  I get great support from the comments on Facebook and  here on the blog as well.  I'm trying not to overdo anything but I've had a couple visitors and talked to a couple folks on the phone.  And a little more of me is healed.

I can begin to do things for myself slowly.  Make a meal, get up and down to get things for myself.  Each day a little more.  Today's victory was vacuuming the carpets on the first floor.  Another step towards normal, another step towards healing.

It's also a time of humility.  Being taken care of at the hospital is one thing.  To realize that you can't do certain things yet and will need help at home is different, at least for me.  My lady wife has suffered through a great many illnesses over the last almost 30 years.  It was my role to care for her in my own fumbling way.  I was the healthy one.  Now I had to ask her to come and dry my feet after a shower.  To help me dry my hair, to dress myself in part because I couldn't lean down far enough to get my pants started.  Her great  love of me has shown through in the sacrifices she's made over the last 10 days.  My ego has had to humble itself to accept those acts of  love.  They are freely offered gifts.  The impact of them has been greater than I expected.  I have been blessed with a true partner and soul mate.  

So the pills every four hours routine continues.  The body feels a little stronger every day.  I've been given leave to "take as much time as I need to heal" from my job but part of me is itching to get back at it.  The compromise is that I'll work just a couple hours a day, from home, for a week then look at going back full time.  It's the compromise position between my feeling that I'm slacking and others feeling that I'm in too big a rush.  If it wears me out too quickly I swear here publicly that I will slow down again.

I promise.

Every day I heal a little more.