Against all odds: My journey to freedom From a heart stroke to walking again

The last thing I remembered was complaining about a back pain. Already exhausted, stressed and self-neglected, my mind slowly and painfully dived into the darkness. No more sounds, no more feelings, no more needs. I felt happy. I felt light. No more worrying. Neat.

A faint recurring beep kept on waking me up. Yeah, I was aware of my surroundings, but something was impeding me from standing and look out. It was a constant battle- no more win - win. Ok, why the heck was I being compelled to contemplating this quietness? It felt nice, but empty. I heard people passing by me, minding their own business but not minding about myself. Amongst all, I felt someone staring at me. Annoyingly looking at me, like arrows going thru me. Uncomfortable, irritating. I don’t like this. I’m not enjoying this at all. I began to panic. I can’t move. Where the heck am I? Everyone around me is moving in quite a hurry. Everyone was staring at me, that fucking look I couldn’t stand, it irritated me. I can’t reach out to them. I feel I’m inside an invisible bubble. I see my brother leave. I see my son and my husband leave. I tried to call them, but no one turns back. None of them come back. 

I’m in complete darkness again.

A faint beep wakes me up. I thought it was my alarm clock. My iPhone was acting weird lately, perhaps a missed programmed alarm or the messed up wake up time. Ok fine I can re-program it, again and again. It’s getting under my skin now. Totally annoying stupid noise. This annoying beeping convinced my eyes to (finally) open. I find myself facing up, I see the white ceiling and a quick reflection of the sun when it hits a watch. Ok I though- time to wake up, get ready, grab a cup of coffee and go to work. 

I realized something was not connecting. I started to panic. I gotta keep my cool. My dad taught me how to keep my cool. My family grew up on big Chinese tradition, I had got to keep my cool. I’m good at it.

I sensed someone was starring at me, but couldn’t tell WHO it was. I heard a voice, saying HI! my friendly side made me answer with another Hi!. And that was as far as it went for that day. 

Days passed by, I felt so good I didn’t mind where I was. I couldn’t differentiate day from night, I didn’t care about the date. I didn’t care about the time. Something was not right. I didn’t mind at all. But I still felt that uncomfortable feeling. Again.

As I started to pay attention, I realized I was in a white room. I couldn’t distinguish pretty well my surroundings, but I could recognize that the beeping was familiar. My curiosity forced me to squint. Aha! My eyes are working! Slowly started to see better. 

I realized I woke up in a hospital bed. Crap I’m in trouble! - what happened?! I wasn’t really explained what really happened. My husband refuses. He said it was too painful for him and my son to explain it.

Yep I woke up in a hospital bed. Don’t move I heard. The needle is going to move and come out! I don’t want to call the doctor again to put it back!

Wtf! A needle?

Ok cool down. For some reason something was telling me just to pull everything restraining my body to just break them and run away. NOPE. Not acceptable my other has told me. My reasoning was right. And I followed. 

I weighed 50 kg. But it was needed a lifter to help me get up from bed to sit down on a wheelchair. I could have easily panic but again? I kept my cool. For some reason I was not into that. I enjoyed it. I felt like I was sitting on a swing chair. One day that enjoyment stopped. No more rides. Time to get out of bed. No Madame, no excuses. I felt like a baby learning to walk. I had to rely on a special type of walker. I started to walk with a forearm wheeled walker. An adult’s walker. For me again, I felt attracted to that apparatus, my curiosity let me play with it. Therapy team started to try to force me to walk again. I learned how to stand up from lying in bed, to seating on the bed side, to stand up and hold to the walker, and make my first foot steps. This time there wasn’t mom waiting for me with open arms. 

During my outings I saw older people than me seating on wheelchairs. Left all crammed to a corner, no Hope. That shocked me to the core. I felt I was not ready for it. I was NOT TO GIVE UP. Something was telling me to get up and get out. Get out of here quick.

I looked forward to my therapy sessions - three times a week for the physical therapy team to come and bring my new toy that help me to walk. On my second week, somehow, I started to gain speed. Problem was to stop myself. Eventually I learned to slow down. The lifter was not needed anymore. One day, I could get up to the nurse’s station back and forth myself and walk on the corridor out to the garden from my room. Then they took away the walker, I refused to walk with a cane, but it was there, just in case. My brother and my husband took turns to care of me. He used to push my wheelchair out to the hospital garden and once we sat down, we reminisced the old times, longing to go out together as before. When I go home we will go out out for a cup of coffee. I kept that in mind. My son missed me. It hurt me to see him going thru all of this suffering. Once he told me he saw me delusional. Crazy. Embarrassing. Not myself.

Therapy was on regular basis now. I had to gain weight, worked out to build leg muscle in order to walk. In order to gain muscle had to eat. Every thing started to have a meaning for me. I felt I had to live in order to stay besides my son and my husband. I was not done. I was young. I was 50.

I told my husband and son I will come out of the hospital walking by my self. All the doctors said, based on my diagnosis that I will never ever walk again. I’m stubborn. I’m a Taurus. I think I have to give credit to that as well. A year later, weighing 68kg, got my paperwork for discharge. I walked out of my room by myself, proud and happy. Hospital policy - had be sitting on the wheel chair. Once we crossed the main entrance door u was free, so u stood up and walked to the car. I felt so happy. Must be what a wrong conviction person left prison. I was free. I broke the curse. 

Against all odds I came out of my prison. 

Thank God I did.