David Heron

It is a day that I will never forget, the 8th of November 2003 I was only 55 years young, and I was at home with my wife and family. Friends of ours had been visiting for the evening; they have two little girls, who were 5 and 3 years of age who are like grand daughters to me. The youngest always insisted that I carry her out to the car when they left for home, that night was no exception.

After carrying her to the car and waving them off I returned to the house. I am secretary of a local youth football club, as well as secretary of an archery club, so as you can imagine there are always things that need doing for one or other of the clubs. On entering the house I headed for my computer to catch up on something or attend to whatever needed doing. As I sat down at the desk my wife appeared and we engaged in idle conversation, after she had left I turned to the keyboard, and as I did it happened.

It was the strangest sensation ever, I felt as if something was spinning around in my head and then it just seemed to wash down over my entire body. As the feeling abated I found that I had a left arm that was very difficult to control and a left leg that seemed very heavy, I checked the mirror looking for any facial differences but thankfully there were none or so I thought. It was only when I started to talk that I realised that the left side of my mouth wasn't moving as it should. My instincts told me that it might be a stroke, but as I had heard that sometimes you can get over a mild stroke within 24 hours, I figured, very stupidly, that I'd wait till morning. I took an aspirin, as I knew I should, I did learn something in St. John Ambulance, and told the wife that, as I didn't feel too good I was going to bed. It was a bit of a struggle to get undressed and ready for bed, but I made it and after getting into bed I slept like a log.

I awoke around 8.00 on the Sunday morning and as I opened my eyes I thought it had all been a dream. It was only as I tried to get up and out of bed I realised that I was still troubled with limbs that seemed to have a mind of their own. I eventually got up and dressed and made my way downstairs, and put the kettle on for a cup of tea. As I drank my tea I felt it dribbling out of the corner of my mouth, this confirmed that I still had problems with the left side of my mouth.

I waited until my wife awoke at around 10.00 am and after making her a cup of tea told her that I thought I should go to the doctor. Once I had informed her of my suspicions all hell broke loose, there had been no panic on my part, now the whole house was up and running around. Well when the emergency doctor finally saw me it didn't take him long to confirm it was a stroke and he phoned the hospital to arrange my admission.

My wife Gill, wanted to go straight to the hospital, I on the other hand wanted to go home first. My youngest son Ben had a football match that afternoon and I always went and watched his matches, home or away. I wanted to wish him luck and give him a few words of advice and encouragement before he went as I usually did. Maybe it was the wrong thing to do under the circumstances, because once he knew what was wrong with me he didn't want to go he wanted to be at the hospital with me. I convinced him that I would be there by half time and off he went. Well I never made it; once the hospital got their hands on me I never got out until the 12th November.

The hospitals staff were brilliant, I had all manner of tests, CT scan, MRI, I was even asked if I would participate in research into stroke recovery, of course I consented and it is still ongoing. It appears that my stroke was attributed to something called 'Small Vessel Disease ', and apparently I could be at risk of another, hence I have this delightful cocktail of medication to take.

The little things that you take for granted like fastening shirt buttons and doing up shoe laces were as difficult as climbing a mountain, but I was fortunate in that it had been my left side that had been affected and as I was naturally right handed I was still able to write etc.

I am sure that the only reason the hospital let me go home when they did was because they got fed up with me asking to go home. They wanted to keep me in a couple of more days or so, but I felt that I would get on much better at home where I would have to do more for myself, and if I had a problem there was always a family member around. After consulting the Physiotherapist, they finally consented to my being allowed home, and so it was that armed with more tablets than I had seen in my life, my wife took me home. It felt strange at first, I felt nervous for some reason, and maybe I should have stayed in the hospital I thought. It had been quite an effort getting back home, I felt drained, so I decided I would head for bed... I had to climb those stairs, I got half way up and found it all too much. I was about to give up and sit down when my daughter, who had unbeknown to me been following me, took my arm and said " come on, we'll do it together ". After that there was always one member of the family on hand if I was struggling with anything, they were all amazing carers.

Getting back to work was my biggest problem, immediately after the stroke I could see improvements on a daily basis, and I thought that I would have made it back before Christmas. I used to spend hours trying to touch all my fingers in turn with my thumb until finally I managed it; it felt like a lifetime achievement. I started getting to grips with fastening shirt buttons etc, although shoelaces were still being rather troublesome.

Unfortunately things didn't go as well as I had hoped, my body had other ideas, after what appeared to be a rapid recovery everything seemed to stop, I could see no improvement and naturally this brought on depression, it was a very hard time not only for me but my family too. I suffered terrible mood swings and unfortunately I took it out on my family, when I talked to my GP about it I was simply told that it was all part of the brain healing process, you have to go through it.

I contacted my employer about a phased return to work and gradually build on it, and after a meeting between my employer, myself and the Stroke Outreach department they finally agreed and I managed to get back to work in July 2004. It was a lot harder than I had thought, I found it a struggle both physically and mentally, but I think the biggest problem was the physical tiredness I felt. I used to go to work in the mornings and go back home to bed in the afternoon. I am an electrician by trade, but due to the residual problems with my left side most tasks are difficult to do which is so frustrating and has compounded my depression. In fact things got so bad that at the end of October 2004 I was declared unfit for work again and I am still working towards a return in March 2005.

I do get a lot of support from the Occupational Therapists from the Stroke Outreach Unit at Addenbrookes Hospital in Cambridge, my close friends, and the doctors at my local practice have been very good to me too. But I owe a great debt to my family for all the help, support and encouragement that they have given to me. I still have residual problems with my left side, but hopefully in time these problems will lessen.

So I would like to take this opportunity to publicly express my thanks to the staff at Addenbrookes Hospital, Cambridge, Diana Day from the Stroke Unit, Wilma Pretorius and Jacqui Cooper my Stroke Outreach Occupational Therapists and my wife Gill and children Justin, Nikki, Jamie and Ben for all their help, support and encouragement.

My aim is to get back into archery, hopefully at some point in 2005 I will try putting my bow together again and see if I can still use it, if I can get one arrow on the target I will be happy. I can imagine all the other club members running for cover if they see me with my bow all ready for use. But what I am aiming for is to stand on the shooting line of an archery tournament and not make a fool of myself.

Thanks to "Different Strokes" and the survivor stories for helping me go forward, and as Linda Leaning said "I feel a bit of a fraud actually sending my experience of a stroke, which seems so minor after reading the other survivor stories."

Good luck to all and don't give up...

Dave Heron

Thanks to Dave for sending in his profile. Anyone else who would like to share their story can send it along with a photograph (if you're not shy!)

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