From the Latin annus for year and vertere meaning to turn, we commemorate important events in our lives. Some are as personal as they are symbolic – like the events that are our rights of passage – a Bar mitzvah or First Communion, a graduation, a marriage, or the birth(s) of our child(ren). Our child(ren)’s birthdays are our anniversaries in parenthood, after all.
Some anniversaries are more solemn – like the death of a parent or a beloved or a world or national victory or tragedy – a surprise attack, the end of a war, a terrorist act, and the like. We mark our calendars with anniversaries in order to remember these events – that we may not forget them.
There are minor anniversaries too. Not everything worth remembering needs to be of great magnitude or consequence. For example, this month is my stroke anniversary. A year ago, I experienced a left thalamic stroke. It changed my life forever. In a moment, it left me numb on the right side of my body, confused, and experiencing difficulty in comprehending and interpreting visual stimuli from my right field of vision. I hate it when that happens.
Recovery from such brain injuries is slow and gradual. I think that much of what has been written about stroke recovery addresses strokes representing much greater brain injuries than those visited by small vessel strokes like mine. I have read that post-stroke recovery can go on for a year. Most of the recovery occurs in the first three to six months, I have read. Thereafter, function returns slowly, if at all, for the remaining year. I have not experienced this.
In my own case, I can confidently say that most of my post-stroke recovery occurred in the 24-48 hours after the acute event. I attribute that recovery to the clot-dissolving therapy that I received in the hospital, but there are studies that would contest my conclusion. Sigh, medicine can be a vexing mistress.
The mental confusion and visual impairment of the acute stroke resolved within hours of my hospital care. I am grateful for that. Since then, I have been left with right-sided numbness and a bit of clumsiness. I’ve never been particularly graceful, but my newly acquired right-sided clumsiness has left me humbled. Today, most of this clumsiness has disappeared although it still manifests in my iPhone texts. Alas. The right-sided numbness remains, and it is mostly noticed in my face and tongue which seem to believe that I have just eaten a spicy jalapeno even when I have just eaten an orange. Sigh.
On this acute illness anniversary, I am grateful to still be among the living, to still be able to enjoy all of the things that I have learned to appreciate over the course of a lifetime, and to be able to feel right-sided numbness and to deal with some clumsiness – both of which help me to be humble.