My Stroke: I'm Still Here

It is interesting that my last blog was posted on April 15, 2017. I suffered a stroke the next morning on, of all places, I-95.

It was Easter morning and I went to pick up my mother. En route home, traffic was light.

I remember looking down at my hand shaking on the console. In the distance, I heard my mother screaming, "Bonni, pull over! Bonni, pull over!" Unbeknownst to me, I was having a stroke. She pulled the car over and we crashed on the side of the highway.

Two Good Samaritans stopped. They were college-age - the man had long hair, and the woman had a knit cap on - ran up to the car. The only thing I remember was watching them run back to their car. They must have seen us slowly crash on the side of the highway since it was my right side that was numb. They called 911.

They saved my life. (Seriously. THEY SAVED MY LIFE. If you see anyone in a white car with the description above, please let them know.)

Watching them run back to their car is the last thing I remember, except for a brief rush of an ambulance crew running me into the hospital. I watched this from above. Was I dead?

I awoke in ICU. Two days later. Unable to move or speak. My family was around me waiting for me to wake up from the surgery. I later learned that I initially went to Stamford Hospital. They gave me a "clot buster" and I was taken to Yale-New Haven Hospital who could better handle a stroke like mine. They used something called a Lazarus procedure whereby they use a tool which goes up through the groin and captures the clot in a mesh net. Yale-New Haven has only been doing the procedure for two years. TWO YEARS!

So much has transpired since: ICU for 3 days, 4 days where I graduated from diaper to walking assisted to the bathroom, and then walking (assisted) in the hallway. This followed by 2 weeks of in-patient recovery at Phelps Memorial Hospital.

My rooms have been like a floral shop. I received so many flowers and gifts. I have a pile of cards, literally, 8-inches high. Once home, beloved friends have visited me. I feel the love.

I am five-months out (really six, but I was on my butt for an entire month). People tell me that I look good and that they would never know I had a stroke. I'm in speech, PT and OT. I have weakness on my right side. My right arm is killing me. I am fluent in my head but not when I speak. I feel stroke-y. But ...

I'M STILL HERE.