The Big Universal Crapshoot

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Brain injury can lead to wearing funny hats.

Back to my “crapshoot” theory of life. You may have read about it in an earlier blog post of mine: http://uncanneryrow.blogspot.com/search?q=crapshoot. The theory was reinforced by my recent stroke, affectionately named BS. In my previous life (before BS), I considered myself a pretty healthy person. Ray & I are old granola-eating hippies. I “eat like a rabbit,” as my son likes to say, which means very little fast/restaurant food, as much local and organic food as I can get here in the land of livestock, loads of veggies, tons of whole grains and legumes, olive oil, few sweets, hardly any bread, tofu, homemade tabouli, falafel, homecooked soups & stews, and mostly chicken, fish, organic venison, and organic lamb when we eat meat. I’m slightly overweight (good winter insulation for prairie folk), but I’m active, and I work damn hard. Oh yeah…and that granola? It’s homemade, low-fat, low-sweet (honey and agave), with all organic ingredients from the co-op.

In spite of our healthy lifestyle, Ray’s had two heart attacks and I’ve had a stroke. Us—not the bazillions of cheeseburger pounding, beer guzzling, sedentary NASCAR-watching, hairspray wearing, preservative-eating, pork rind and sour cream dip aficianados out there. They’re often perfectly healthy. (Sorry…I’m working on my teensy weensy bitterness.)

Anyway, BS left me with left-side “weakness and incoordination.” That’s stroke-speak for no paralysis or numbness but an inability to use much of the left side. Try touching each fingertip of one hand to the thumb on that hand—I couldn’t do that with my left hand at first. But it’s coming back—I can do most things now, though everything’s much slower and requires concentration. My left knee still can’t quite decide if it’s supposed to lock or not (c’mon Brain…we need a new neural pathway for this!), so it just kind of flops back and forth, and I look like Frankenstein when I walk (ironic, since this is the novel my Honor’s students are studying this semester in my absence). I wouldn’t admit this for a long time…till now, really…but my entire left side was affected, so the left side of my throat is weak, and if I talk (or try to sing) too long, I get tired and hoarse. Also, if I’m upright for a while, my stomach muscles start to hurt just like I’d done 100 crunches. It’s almost as if trying to control (ha! such a myth…) or re-route my left side requires so much new brain and muscle energy that it quickly wears my body out. In fact, any use of my left side seems to require extraordinary effort followed by a nap.

Granola & morning meds...mmm!

I don’t quite have a handle on the emotional baggage of BS, either. Sometimes, suddenly and for no apparent reason, my stomach muscles tighten like a giant sash, and the floodgates open. I’m really good at quickly bringing this under control (hehe...there's that myth again), but I’m not sure that’s such a good thing. One possible disadvantage of immediate and constant loving care after something like this is that one is never alone to really let go emotionally till one is tapped out. I think a person who’s had a stroke, accident, heart attack, etc. needs to grieve for their former life. Otherwise, it’s like a constant shadow a half-step behind. 

Anyway, this probably wasn’t a smart move on my part, but last weekend, we went to the funeral of our friends’ son—a 26-year-old kid just pulling his life together, who died in an accidental apartment fire. We had just gone to his dad’s funeral last summer, making it doubly sad. Then, the next day, I went to our semi-monthly SOPD (Sisters of Perpetual Disorder) dinner. When all 20+ women stood to say they’d do whatever I needed to help me recover, I was completely overwhelmed. I had to beat a hasty retreat, so I wouldn’t burst into tears and turn the dinner into one giant sobfest of gratitude and sister-love. Mom is still coming every day to stay with me. Having my 77-year-old mommy commute daily to the farm to take care of me isn’t exactly how I saw things developing in my life, though I can’t imagine how we would all have gotten through this without her.

In addition to the immediate physical and emotional wreckage of BS, the stroke brought other changes, as well. No more daily caffeine, which for me was dang near a French Roast IV drip. Now, I buy incredibly expensive decaf beans, so I can keep my daily coffee rituals. And I’ve started drinking a bit of decaf tea now & then. No nicotine anymore. Yes, I still smoked, though not that much and only chemical-free cigs. Smoking was a ritual, too…10 minutes on the back porch, watching the rural scene, away from the gizmos and noise…ah. Meds. Before BS, I never took anything except Advil or vitamins. Now I have a daily pill reminder case. Argh. I take my blood pressure at least twice a day. We just finished a sleep study (people with apnea are 4 times more likely to have strokes and/or heart attacks), and it looks like we’ll be picking out his & hers CPAP machines in the next couple of weeks—they come in blue paisley, right? Praise all that’s holy my neurologist said to keep up the red wine because it can lower cholesterol. Giving up wine would have been the last straw…

Ray and I are trying not to BE our health issues, not to be THOSE people—the ones whose world is all doctor appointments, lab numbers, and medical jargon. I like to think the Universe was tenderly hobbling us with these little setbacks, helping us slow down and re-prioritize before we end up with BIGGER problems from which we can’t recover. I like to think I’m learning important stuff from all this. I like to think it’s an opportunity to re-evaluate and re-direct our energies. And I did get a huge batch of yummy granola made (guess what everyone’s getting for Christmas this year?).

Sleep study or Borg assimilation?

These health “blips” might be the result of lousy genes—I just found out my dad and mom both have high BP. Or, they might be from too many vices for too many years—I did have the stroke “quadrifecta”: Stress, high BP, high cholesterol, and smoking. But then, I’m in Walmart picking up prescriptions and plantar fasciitis heel pads, and I get a gander at the people walking about who have NOT had heart attacks or strokes, and in a moment of brilliant clarity I know the ugly truth: It’s just the Big Universal Crapshoot.