Thank you all. Such warmth emanating from this forum....so very much appreciated.
Dtrad...nasty experience. Is their any relationship between this experience and your travelling? Though I do notice your stroke occurred in Costa Rica. Great that you recovered and the extra emotion would be a welcome trade off as against the alternative.
Mum is 86 so good innings.
Results thus far....stroke was 'severe'. Left side arm no movement at all. Left leg weakened. No feeling on left side of face. Not sure that she has any vision at all and I feel sick to my stomach thinking about this.
Re brain swelling....I am told that swelling that can occur after a stroke...even in the first few days....is not usually a problem in the elderly as the brain has already shrunk and their is more room for it to swell without added pressure accumulating. I am learning more by the minute.
Mum has been admitted now and I am not really comfortable with this combined men/women in rooms...call me old fashioned but it just seems odd. Staff still wonderful.
So it now appears that the clot came from the chest due to atrial fibrillation, although not confirmed. Because Mum cannot follow commands (Alzheimers) rehabilitation will not necessarily work for her I'm told. Therefore the process from here is to just see how she rehabilitates on her own (??). Thoughts of what might have been a better outcome creep into my mind....it is what Mum would have preferred. She has always been a positive person....always.....and even now in this condition she has a little humour.....if you can call the threat to turn the hose on the doctor for hurting her humorous. It made me reflect that I had made it through my childhood without having the hose turned on me...!!
It's just that she would so dearly love to be with her Jack...her husband of 60 odd years who departed this world in a much more respectable manner (passed away suddenly in his sleep) some 4 years ago. She is always 'talking to him' even through the haze and even now is mentioning his name so many times. They were so very close. Walked everywhere hand in hand. It is heart-wrenching.
I now sit and wonder what tomorrow will bring. At some time we will leave her here and then come back early in the morning.
