The five R's of Recovery and Rehabilitation or take time to smell the roses!

Take time to smell the roses is an old favorite line of mine, one to whidch ai should have b33n qdhering more. HERE'S WHY, BSSED ON A LETTER WRITTEN TO MY CLSSMATES ON THE OCCASION OF OUR FIFTIETH HIGH School reunion:

“Let go (of stress and compulsion) and keep balance in life”, was advised by a neuropsychologist at the Los Gatos Community Hospital Rehabilitation Center after my recent stroke. Even though I can’t be with you directly at our singularly important fiftieth year reunion, due to a stroke I suffered June 7th, I am able to write you at least, and for this capacity, I do rejoice. I am very deeply saddened, though, and pretty blue, that I can not be with you in person on the occasion or our Reunion Dinner, taking place as it is at the historic P. & L. E. Station Square, a historic spot for me and my family. My father traveled from this very station on the P. & L. E. Railroad line to his sales region surrounding Cleveland, Ohio. What a great man Joseph Miraglia, my father, was. The station is also the placer my parents and I saw my determined brother, Peter, off to the Marines, headed for Paris Island in South Carolina, via Cleveland where he was enlisting in the Marines, after just turning 17 years of age in 1959. When his train actually pulled off to Cleveland on that occasion, my parents and I dissolved into tears. Such ties of the heart!

Also, Station Square is at the bottom of the Hill (Coal Hill, we called it, where my husband,Paul, and I proudly purchased our first home, on Sycamore St. in Mt. Washington over looking the Monongahela River and steel works below. How we loved that view.)

Please be assured, how much I would have loved to have seen all of you again and to have been with you.

On June 7th, I had a fateful drive home following a celebration of a colleague’s graduation from law school (made especially important to me because the colleague was someone I had mentored since her arrival from Kosovo as a refugee at the end of the 90’s). During the drive home on a major highway in California, Rte.17, I experienced blurred, double-vision, light headedness and dizziness and exhaustion. Surely my now deceased parents must have been hovering nearby as my guardian angels, as I had no accident on that busy highway. I recall only a few apparently unnerved fellow drivers of the highway having honked in worry, concern or perhaps irritation. During the stroke, then, I managed to pull off the highway (to take city streets home), pulled over in a neighborhood and parked the car. There I dozed, woke and tried to pull out of my parking space and crazily began hitting other parked cars. After hitting three parked cars, police were called. Paramedics determined the symptoms looked like a stroke and took me to O”Connor (Catholic) Hospital, a certified stroke center, where their specialty stroke team diagnosed the stroke during the crucial three hour window for treatment, and they administered TPA, for which I signed off on myself.

My husband described the rejoicing of the emergency room staff when my limp left leg shot up after a command for such after the medicine took effect.

In the emergency room, I asked my doctor would I be able to go to Pittsburgh on the 27th. He said yes, I would be able to.

But the rest is history. Though I did, indeed, make a remarkable recovery, residual symptoms of left side weakness and some poor coordination persisted and I was ultimately denied the green light to proceed with plans to Pittsburgh for our occasion.

All I am left to do now is wish may best to all of you and share the lessons of the experience with you.

Let me start by sharing one insight I got today when I repeated a line my own Mother had used many times during her own various health conditions: “I am the captain of my own ship.”

The speech therapist today wisely suggested: “Yes, indeed you are the captain of your ship, but if you get a hole in the ship, you have to know it.”

The neuropsychologist here agreed with the metaphor, but said: “It’s not so much that there is a hole in the ship, but to be executing all the necessary commands to execute the ship of self, one has to be mindful of all-- the state of the ship, its current state and condition and signals and all the surround
mindfulness of self, body and environment

Good advice for sure. And I share it with all of you.

She and I are creating a therapy for stroke survivors and other survivors of life.

Relax, Rest, Restore, Rejoice, and Respect everything about self (including body)—an “R” offered by one of the physical therapists here.

For me, I will always respect spirit and meaning and you, all, will always be a big part of my spirit and have much meaning for me.

God bless each and everyone of you and thank you for your contribution to my life’s pilgrimage.

Sincerely,

Karita Miraglia Hummer
June 28, 2008