Moving Forward

October 2. This week has been interesting to say the least. I found that trying to get dad to speak on demand is almost impossible. But, one day he saw my brother's spare tire on the car, and drew a picture of a circle and put 4 dots indicating lug nuts. Then drew another circle and put 4 dots. Pointing to one circle then the other, counting out loud, 1 2 3 4, 1 2 3 4 5. Couldn't figure out what he was trying to convey. Dad was frustrated that he couldn't get his point across.

  Today, he had me goose chasing around the house. He has a dentist appt tomorrow. He takes antibiotics before his appointment to prevent infection. So for a half an hour, I played 20 questions to figured out what he wanted. He had me get the phone book. He flipped through it. I don't know why, he can't read.

  I'll have to work on a new picture board this week

  On the good side, dad is able to rewrite a word without looking at it. A month ago, he could not do that.

  Dentist appointment tomorrow. Should go ok. .

Reap The Rewards

September 29. This afternoon dad called me into the room and had his picture board in his lap. He was looking for the pic of his water. I didn't think he understood using the board for communication. Wow. :)).

Door Opens, Then Slams Shut

September 23. The last week has been interesting. On one day dad can speak some numbers, 1-6. Identifies a few pictures, cup, toilet, pen. The next day, nothing.
  Speech appointment today. Therapist says there is a little progress. Dad seemed to be receptive to gesturing, like sign language. He actually was mimicking the therapist. But she said that I could work on just simple things at first.

No School Today

September 17. No daily dose of home school today. Dad's friend's memorial is today.

A Change In The Plan

September 16. Second speech therapy appointment. Went as well as the first. Therapist told me to gather pictures from magazines of different things to use to work on identifying object that he might be familiar with, such as cars, a dog, a house, etc. I asked her if taking photos of things around the house and posting them on card board would be ok. She said it would be fine.   There has to be a way to get through. This Wernickes stroke has caused a lot of grief. But I'm not going to let it beat him down.

Do You Smoke?

September 14. Took dad to a cardiology appointment. The nurse asked a series of questions about medications, allergies, etc. Then the nurse asked dad, "Do you smoke?" Dad responded "Yes." Dad has never smoked.

A Daily Dose

September 7. Dad's first speech therapy session. Didn't go very well. The therapist held up three cards with drawings. A hammer, dice, and a ball. She held an actual hammer and asked dad to point to the card with hammer drawn on it. Dad was unable to identify any of the cards with the actual object. Unable to speak the words.
  The therapist told me to gather items around the house and use them along with showing him how to write the name of the item. I wrote the name of the item on masking tape and taped it on several things that he was familiar with. I am starting what I call "a daily dose of home school" for 30 minutes every day that dad is able to attend.
  This morning before we left for the appointment, I found out dad's long time friend of 65 years passed away. His wife's friend said the memorial will be August 17. I didn't want to tell dad but if he was fully recovered and found out, he would be upset that I didn't tell him. So I did. To my surprise, dad seemed to understand.

On The Road To Recovery?

September 1. Dad's doctor put a referral in for dad to go to outpatient speech therapy. Today is his first visit. It's actually an evaluation. Speech therapist says that after her evaluation, she feels that it is a Wernickes stroke, not Broca. And that the prognosis for recovery is not as good. Age plays a part, she says. The cut off point is about 75 years. Dad is 83. I told the therapist that dad along with not being able to fully understand most of what was being said, he also can't write, read, identify things that belong to him, speak except garbled words with an occasional word such as "and", no nouns at all. He doesn't know how to use the telephone, take his medications (he found some pills he stashed in his night stand in an old ibuprofen bottle and took a few, I asked him what they were. He half grinned, shrugged his shoulders and said, " a kns'd know").
  Dad was authorized for 4 visits. Once a week. Yay!! I told the therapist, "Just tell me what I need to do".
  On the way home I thought about all this. He can't even watch tv. How is he going to keep occupied? He does sleep a lot, especially right now, He just has alot of doctor visits, about 3 per week. It wears him out. But what about the rest of the time? Trapped inside his own head. A prisoner held against his will. Wernickes stroke is, how should I say, a living hell.

Bad Wernickes

August 31. Let's just say that this Wernickes stroke is a bad thing. Every day has been a challenge. I thought maybe I had bit off more than I could chew. Last Wednesday, at 7 am, dad was getting up from his bed. Probably called out to me, by the way, my new name is 'abeeb', one time it was 'mother'. Anyway, I was in the back yard watering my patio plants, thinking dad was still asleep. I guess he needed help, so he reached for his "Help, I've fallen and can't get up" button. Needless to say the paramedics and fire department weren't happy with us.

Bad News And More Bad News

August 24. I've jumped ahead a bit. The last week has been very challenging. The days and nights are full of events of dad being confused. The nights are just as bad, waking up to hearing hime yelling, HEY!. And finding out he's dreaming.
 My son bought a program from a company called, "Proloque". http://www.assistiveware.com/index.php The company specializes in speech assistance programs. They may only provide programs for Mac users. I'm not sure at this point. My son down loaded the program into an iPad. I tried to work with dad on the program that uses flash cards and pronounces the words. Dad couldn't say the words. Just looked blankly at the little computer. I pulled up a picture of a toilet, and asked dad, did he know what it was. He looked for a few seconds and said no.
  I took dad to his follow up appointment for his hospital stay. The doctor talked to dad and said that there was Wernickes involvement. I found out from the good ol' internet after we got home that Wernickes area is next to the Broca area. Both on the left side of the brain. The doctor said when there is Wernickes damage, the patient is unable to understand language, unable to speak understandably. Here is a link from YouTube of a patient with a Wernickes stroke.
 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=67HMx-TdAZI&p=9CC5D854FF3E2DB8&playnext=1&index=29

Something More Is Wrong Than I Thought

August 18. The physical therapist called around 9am. She wanted to come to the house for an evaluation. During her evaluation, she asked dad to raise his right arm. Dad followed along watching the physical therapist raise her right arm, and raised his left arm. Then the physical therapist told dad to raise his right arm. The P.T. did not raise her right arm this time. Dad just stared at her. She told dad again to raise his arm, and nothing, just a stare. There is more to what's going on here, I thought. Well, not paying attention to what the P.T. was telling me, I was very agreeable, and went along with discharging dad from home health care, including speech therapy.

Dad Comes Home

August 17. Dad comes home. No big issues, but he very tired, as we didn't arrive home until around 7pm.

Good News, Bad News

August 15th. The neurologist came in and tested dad with 'following instructions'. The doctor told dad to raise his right arm. Dad looked at the doctor raising his own arm, and dad followed suit, except that dad raised his left arm, which of course was on the doctor's right. Now the other arm, now the legs. Good news the doctor said usually people recover in a couple of weeks. But some will have lingering problems, and there are some people who never recover. I assumed the doctor meant dad would recover in a couple of weeks. And of course the bad news was that yes, the C.T. scan showed damage on the left side of dad's brain. Because dad followed the doctor's instruction, he said dad had a 'Broca' stroke. Then he left. I came home and jumped on the internet to look up Broca stroke. Broca strokes effect the left side of the brain. At the time of the stroke the damage in this area causes the patient speech to be not understood by others. There is usually improvement as time progresses, depending on the severity, age of patient, the amount of improvement differs.This link will take you to YouTube. The video shows a teenage girl who suffered a Broca stroke. It's a little long, but you'll get an understanding of what it is. There are also other videos there .  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1aplTvEQ6ew&feature=fvw

A Terrible Thing Happened: My Father Had a Stroke

August 14, 2010. My father who I will refer to as 'dad', woke up from his nap about 3:00 in the afternoon on a Saturday, walked out to the living room and sat in his chair. From another room, I heard him say something, but not 'hearing' him quite right, I went to the living room and asked him what did he say. And out came the most garbled speech! I asked him to repeat what he said, and again, the same thing. I felt a little weak in the knees as I had seen this before with other people's relatives. I knew what had happened. My dad had a stroke. I asked him if he was in any pain. He said no. I told him to stay put, and I dialed 911. By the time the paramedics arrived, my dad stopped responding to any questions, and stared out the window. The paramedic yelled at him, "hey, look at me!" My dad slowly turned toward him, with a flat facial affect. He would not squeeze the paramedics fingers when asked, or communicate in any way. Just stared. The paramedics scooped dad up and took him to Loma Linda University Medical Center, which is not the closest facility, but are better equiped to handle strokes. Later that night, dad was transfered to his insurance provider hospital. The doctors ran more tests to try to locate where the damage had occured in his brain. I would have to wait for the doctor to talk with me about how much damage there was.

Backing Up

This is my first post and I want to start out by saying that I wanted to start at the beginning. But I am about 6 weeks behind. So I will make entries starting at the time of the stroke. I will also try to put links from time to time that I found helpful. It's not been very long, and already its been quite a journey. Until tomorrow....