...and it was GOOD that I was afflicted!
You have to understand something, I went through something awful, catastrophic and unbelievably traumatic, for one so young. It seemed like forever, but it was only 6-8 months. I had the stroke on November 4th 1989. I was discharged COMPLETELY from their care on April 24th 1990.
I have to say the lack of care I received was BEYOND neglect. However, THIS was 1989, nearly 30 years ago. Young people have strokes now, ALL the time but back then? They didn't! And they sure as hell made ALL their mistakes on me! I WAS an experiment!
As I said it was ONLY 6 months. HOWEVER. Those 6 months WERE the LONGEST 6 months of my life. In the death wing of a hospital where the other wing was a MENTAL HOSPITAL (Maudsley - AKA Mental Maudsley) NO internet. NO phone. ONE channel (yes we had 4 but I couldn't reach the TV and there was no remote, so had to make do with BBC 1 - what with all the old people there! Neighbours at the time the only decent thing on that channel, no home & away - OMG I hear the 'Going for Gold' theme tune, even now? I cry!) So, the story SO far, those pesky aneurysms? Where did they come from? This is where the story gets kind of miraculous. I had a congenital heart defect. I was born with coarctation of the aorta. As I grew, the MAIN artery in my heart DID NOT GROW AT ALL!
What THIS meant was, at 15 years of age, I was wandering around with a MAIN ARTERY of a newborn baby! THIS had caused the aneurysms to form as they are weaknesses in the blood vessels of the brain.
However, miracle above all miracle, that night as my blood pressure rose for God knows what reason, I had a bleed somewhere else.
Why didn't one of the aneurysms burst?
THE DOCTORS DIDN'T KNOW!
My trust in doctors, remember, is at best wary at worse non-existent at this point. So, where do we go now?
THEY DON'T KNOW.
"If we correct the coarctation? It could cause your blood pressure to rise, the aneurysms WILL burst and you WILL die, conversely, IF we operate on the aneurysms? It could cause your blood pressure to rise, they WILL burst and you WILL die."
So there's one thing I knew, despite their assurances that I wouldn't die, WHATEVER happened, I was going to die.
DO YOU SEE MY ISSUE? I am 15, remember?
So, I promised you funny stories and ALL that doesn't sound too funny does it? But it's a good background to at least one...
We're hanging around the entrance. My friend offers me a cigarette, I had smoked before, not really at that point in a real habitual sense, but if offered one, I'd take it? So, she offers me this cigarette and I look at her and say. "I can't my brain might blow up!"
I mentioned above, the Maudsley? The Maudsley is a well known psychiatric unit, known as 'mental Maudsley' but at the time, it was also the base of the neurological unit, my friends liked to point out that it was apt that I found myself in 'Mental Maudsley' being that I WAS mental! (Sadly, ADHD? I could hardly argue, I was undiagnosed, but symptomatic)
They visited, mostly, every night (in shifts - love 'em) and would wheel me around. They had a love of places we shouldn't frequent, like the upper levels with no electricity, which leads rather nicely to a story I remember clearly. They wheel me across a grassed area toward where the psychiatric part was. Some person comes tearing out of the psychiatric ward, their arms spinning like windmills? My friends, obviously leg it, WITHOUT ME! Only one side of my body works? So I'm spinning in circles in this wheelchair, in fear of my very life. Before one comes back, apologises, whispering "Sorry, excess baggage!" And wheels me away!
Another time, some friends take me out the front of the hospital, there's a ramp, we go flying down the rap, then he's wheeling all around the bottom and suddenly hits a kerb, the wheelchair stops? I DO NOT!
Later on, after the heart operation and whilst I was waiting for the brain operation, someone managed to get ahold of a speak and spell and as my friend wheeled me up and down the corridor, I'd press the 'R' So a mechanical voice would be heard ALL over the ward, just going 'Arr, Arr, Arr, Arr.' It was our 'robot in pain or having sex' gag and I especially found this hilarious.
It was a LONG and arduous journey, but mostly BORING AS FUCK! I spent ALOT of time on my own, daydreaming, praying, writing and I HAD to like my own company because I had no fucker else. And that is why I HAVE to say, it was GOOD that I was afflicted. I now spend most days COMPLETELY on my own and I prefer it, I am introspective and easily occupied despite my ADHD. I can lose myself in a fantasy that I have made up myself, because running with wolves is better than sitting in a ward filled with people who are in Gods waiting room, I spent my time in Gods waiting room and all I can say is BORED NOW!
It taught me A LOT. Stuff a 15-year-old should NOT have experienced, but I value that experience because, despite the memory of it being so traumatic, it is MY memory and despite forcing myself to forget most of it, it has somehow bled into who I am and has made me a fair bit wiser! It took me a long time but at 42 I finally OWN it.
I still get depressed in November, but I've learned that is just my body remembering and because I own it I can hold on until December when I start to feel better. If it coincides with my menstrual cycle, it REALLY makes me wish for early menopause, though!
BUT, it is what it is and I am who I am because of it. I'm finally okay with it. You see, it robbed me, of SO much. My rapid recovery meant I built no stamina and I suffer from post-stroke fatigue syndrome, but more than that, it occurred in my GCSE year. I missed that final year and consequently failed the exams I sat. Interestingly, I did not sit for my English GCSE but passed at a 'C' due to coursework, but I really felt like my education was COMPLETELY robbed because ANYTHING I had learned before the stroke, kind of disappeared.
I don't remember ANYTHING I learned at school.
Which is sad, but thanks to youtube, I have educated myself in numerous areas, including criminology and psychology. SO, this is the point where, I have to say, I AM smart, you JUST can't prove it on paper!
