StrokeSurvivorBlog

When Steve had a massive ischemic stroke in February 2008, it paralyzed the left side of his body. Regaining arm function after his stroke looked grim. This one-sided paralysis is called hemiplegia. But as weeks went by, he started to regain leg movement, but nothing in his arm. So the diagnosis was changed to one-sided weakness, or hemiparesis.

I remember well the day when, three months after his stroke, Steve saw a neurologist – a stroke specialist. She was very knowledgeable and said he probably would never regain arm function again.  I think she wanted us to accept the reality of his disability, but her comment upset me so much that, under my breath, I rebuked that diagnosis in the name of Jesus. To me, that comment took away all hope, and I rejected it because God is the God of ALL hope, and I chose to believe that Steve would regain arm function again. Her diagnosis motivated me to prove her wrong.

Steve exhibited some very promising signs of recovery. He had then, and still has now some unusual involuntary movement in his arm and hand. “Involuntary” means that he can’t control the movement. It just happens when one of the brain signals gets crossed. When he yawns, his left arm will lift up as if there’s nothing wrong with it. The same thing happens to his hand when he’s stimulated…it lifts up and completely opens. This is a neurological condition called dyskinesis where the brain sends the signal to the wrong body part. Even though the movement is involuntary, it still exercises his arm muscles and it keeps his hand and fingers limber. I reasoned that we should be able to harness that movement to make it voluntary where Steve controlled the movements.

So I became diligent to exercise his arm, hand and fingers everyday. I encouraged him to try to move along with me. Just him trying to move would help to “rewire” the brain to do the task even though he couldn’t move it by himself. This brain re-wiring is called neuroplasticity. These exercises proved to be very effective, because now he has some voluntary movement. When we first started these exercises, it took much of Steve’s concentration to make even the smallest movement, and that made him mentally fatigued and gave him a headache after 3 or 4 minutes. But now it’s getting much easier and the movements are larger, which is the start of him regaining his hand and arm function.

While Steve was in the nursing home, he met a man whose wife was a stroke survivor and artist. The stroke affected her painting hand, but she did not give up. Daily she picked up the paint brush, and with her strong hand she closed the fingers of her affected hand around it. Through this self-therapy, she regained full hand and arm function after stroke and was painting again. This story so encouraged Steve that he started to work the fingers of his left hand with his right hand. As a result, his hand has always stayed pliable and it’s slowly coming back.

However, many survivors with hemiparesis never regain arm function after stroke because they completely neglect their weak arm. They compensate by using their strong arm instead. This one-sided neglect closes the re-wiring pathways to the weaker arm, their hand becomes frozen shut and they’re never able to use it again.  That’s why occupational therapy is imperative in regaining hand and arm function after stroke.

But I must admit that we don’t exercise Steve’s arm as much as we should. This takes perseverance, patience and time. For us, the ideal time to do therapy is first thing in the morning, but that doesn’t always happen when we have a busy schedule. The more I read about neuroplasticity, the more I’m encouraged to make time for this type of therapy. Then one day, soon I hope, Steve’s arm function will return.

Speaking of arm function, I’d like you to see a video of Steve arm wrestling while he was in the nursing home. I hope you enjoy it and take time to view the other videos I recorded of his recovery process.

Until next time…

Kathy