An Unwelcome Visitor :-  Chapter 2


          The first couple of weeks at home were a little weird at first, almost surreal,  I just felt that this was not happening to me!  I had endured three sessions of Steroid infusions, a drip in my arm that slowly, oh so bloody slowly, filled me full of steroids!  This I sat through for what each time seemed forever and the hope was, this may  kick start my system into behaving itself and start acting normally.  I was pinning so much on these bloody steroids being the miracle that was going to put everything back to normal but alas,  it was not to be,  my recovery would take a lot longer!  
               I waited and waited but I just seemed to be getting worse.  My walking was now really bad and I had to move about with the aid of a frame, those who have/do use one will know what I mean, awkward to say the least! My speech, although I was unaware, was now very bad, I knew what I was saying but it came out of my mouth incomprehensible, this would really annoy me, "what do you mean, you didn't understand, are you stupid", of course they weren't but I was too wrapped up in my own confusion to worry about anyone else! 
                       This period of my life,  I refer to as  'the dark times',  it is only now that I have come to even 'acknowledge' them, it is so easy to 'forget' or in my case 'choose' to forget but you can only 'bottle' things up for so long before they start to 'eat' away at you!
         It was during those early months,  I started to attend weekly physio sessions at the local hospital, at first I thought 'what good are they going to do, nothing! Every time I laid down flat,  I vomited or became extremely nauseus, either way,  I knew I did not want to do any of my exercises that involved me laying down!  I think that this must have frustrated the hell out of the physios, god bless them but I stood my ground, do what you want but don't make me lay flat and roll-over!   It was during these sessions that I was persuaded to attend my first 'group meeting'!  It was a very small group, only six of us and I was the most 'newly' diagnosed, so as you can imagine, I stared a lot and listened even more!  I was angry and scared in equal measure!  A woman, younger than me, looked me in the eye and told me, 'this is as good as you are going to get, just make the most of it'!  I soon decided, in a matter of seconds, groups were not for me and from that day on,  I chose to deal with it on my own and in my own way.  That was the case until as recent as this year (2013)
          During the first six months, after regular visits to have physio, although I was not really aware, improvements were starting to happen on almost a weekly basis.  My walking had improved so much, I had gone from a frame, to crutches to a stick, the vomiting had stopped and I started to gain back the wait that I had lost. All of these improvements were noticed by everyone else but me! Things just seemed to be going nowhere or at least far too slowly, boredom led to me getting really low, was I depressed, I don't know but I was extremely pissed off!  My self esteem had taken a good kicking, I did not want to be in any photos,  I chose to stay in and not mix with many people outside of my wife and  kids,  I had developed this feeling that I had become some kind of freak, the sort of person that people avoided or engaged in the most minimal of interactions with!  This could not be further from the truth but I was totally blinkered,  I felt crap,  so I must have looked crap,  this was the philosophy that I had adopted and it took years to overcome these feelings!  During this 'dark period',  my wife stopped me from wallowing in self pity!  She washed me, cleaned my teeth, helped me to the toilet,  made sure that I did not get too used to 'not caring' about myself.  I would be a liar if I were to say that there must have been times when she thought she had had enough,  not only was there me to look after but there were three young children to take care of and go out to work too!  Family members helped out enormously and  I would gradually 'allow'  into my world some family members who new all about me, who could see that the person they were looking after, was nothing like the person I was before! Just as  important, I started to meet up with  friends and colleagues from work.  They would visit on a regular basis,  let themselves in and stay and sit with me.  We would talk about everything and  anything, we laughed, I got angry, sad, every kind of emotion you could think of.  They would make coffee for us,  help me out of the chair, help me to the toilet, even hold the bowl for me to be sick into!  It was during these times that I began to value friendship,  they did not have to do it but they did and I am eternally grateful to these people. They saw me at my worst,  at my lowest but they all had a part in my rehabilitation,  above all,  they were patient with the patient!

Chapter .3 To follow soon :-