Dear LPG, 

There is life after a stroke.  

I had one and it was bad.   I thought that that was the end of my life as I knew it.   I was in hospital for 4 months after it all happened, and I have to say that it seemed as if I was there forever.  The days passed very slowly but I got home, and the next few months were spent worrying about just about everything. 

With time, it did get easier, but I suppose the one thing that you do have when you are recovering from such a traumatic life-event is time to analyse your life and put the most negative spin on it possible: especially on its future.  Looking back, I suppose that I was so busy worrying about exactly how the days ahead would pan out that I never noticed the little improvements that were gradually happening.   

During that time when I was recovering at home, there were regular visits to the neurologist and although he was telling me about some very positive progress I was making, for some reason I was only really focussing on the negative.   

While I was making a little progress which he could see with each passing visit, when he summed up my progress, I was only hearing what I had not achieved until one visit about a year later when he suggested that I try to get my driver’s license back again.  I have to say that that day’s visit left me surprised and for the first time I started focussing on the positive. 

Before I knew it I found myself on a 6-hour course of driving lessons and a test to make sure that you can use the adapted equipment.  I had three two-hour sessions and then went back for the test, which took 4 weeks in all. As with many people who have had a stroke I have been left unable to use the limbs on one side of my body.  But I learnt how to control an adapted car only using my left leg and arm.  

I am not saying that this will work for everyone, but I would never have believed that I would ever be this independent again.  

Now I regularly find myself behind the wheel again, which is something that I never dreamed that I would never be able to do.   I am still a wheelchair user, with only one arm and leg that I can use, but I can get myself where I want to go, park and get into my wheelchair independently which has given me the outside world back. 

The only other thing that worried me was how I was going to be able to afford all the adaptations needed, but if you find yourself in need of mobility allowance, you can opt for the financial benefit or having an adapted car.   So, I must thank the Queen Elizabeth foundation, and everyone who helped in my recovery, for giving me my freedom back. 

Can I also take this opportunity to say to any reader who is recovering from an illness or accident that has left them seeing very little on the horizon by way of positivity…

 ‘Don’t be too ready to only see the worst’…

JD, Southwark

LPG found some very basic information… 

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