The Recovery

Luckily, My2Mom's stroke was mild. It impaired her right side extremities but, little else. The day after she checked into the hospital her grip strength was probably 10% of her typical strength. She couldn't lift her hand to feed herself and was unable to sit up by herself.

I spent most of each day in the hospital with her...trying to make sense of what had happened. She spent about 4 days in the hospital and was transferred to a rehabilitation center to make her recovery. She was obviously frightened and saddened by her ordeal, as anyone would be. But she made good progress over the next 2 1/2 weeks or so. So much so that by the start of the third week she was walking again with a walker and her caregivers were talking about making arrangements for her to come home.

By this time she was cycling to a manic phase and I took her out of the rehab center for dinner and a movie. She was in a wheel chair the whole time but we had fun...she was upbeat and making good progress. The next day I arrived at the center to see her sitting on a ledge in front of the entrance smoking a cigarette she had bummed from one of the nurses (yes, one of the nurses). And she stood right up when I arrived and we walked in together. I thought to myself, too bad not every stroke victim could make as much progress as a bipolar in a manic swing. But, I was happy nonetheless.

We spoke with the caregivers and they suggested that if things stayed the way they were she'd be out in 2 days. The only thing that really concerned them at this point was a some bump, like a swollen spider bite, on the back of her neck below her left ear. It was red and swollen and she was having trouble turning her head. They'd look after it over the next few days.

Unfortunately, the bump was more than a spider bite.