Graeme Clarke, 44
LOSING my speech was overwhelming. I could handle walking with a limp, but I couldn't face not being able to speak properly ever again. I found it frustrating. I knew what I wanted to say but saying it was a completely different matter. This was everything to me; my communication with my family, my job and just being able to speak with my friends was an immense struggle.
My stroke has had an effect on every aspect of my life. As well as affecting me physically, it affects me cognitively and emotionally – how I feel and how I think. When it happened, I thought it would only last short-term and I would bounce back to my normal self and my normal life. However, the longer I spent in hospital, the more I realised this was a long-term condition and I felt frustrated not being in control.
It’s not just my stroke – it’s a family illness. I have three children and at the time of my stroke my children were only one, five and eight years old. The five and one year old were too young to understand my situation but my eight year old couldn't understand why I was speaking differently and not being able to walk properly. My wife was a rock dealing with three children, an ill husband and looking after the house.
Throughout my 10 weeks in hospital, I participated in speech and language therapy and physiotherapy. It was like being back at my first day of school not knowing what to expect. My speech and language therapist was patient and she broke my speech down into parts – vocabulary, dictation and mouth movements. After hospital, my speech and language therapy continued but I was also practising every single day with my wife.
The support once you are out of hospital is great, but only you can take control of a stroke and believe you will get better. My physiotherapists were great, I found this more normal as I was used to training my body to get better – the thing was it was just different and instead of training for a triathlon, I was training to get better in mind and body.
Life after a stroke for me was all about money and surviving day to day. My confidence has taken a dent but with time it is getting better. I still find it difficult not being able to speak properly like I used to, I suppose you always want to get better, but I need to remember where I came from.
For me, getting better is about the mental and physical aspects. My mental health is feeling better but my physical health is improving over time. I have no hesitation to do the things I was doing pre-stroke like cycling, swimming and socialising. I may do them slower, or differently, but I can still do them well.
Eventually, after I secured a job my wife and I could think about our perspective on our life. We decided that life is short, so we sold our house and moved into another, we don’t think too much about the future but live life one day at a time. My work days are shorter and less stressful, my outlook on life is not all about getting on but working to live, rather than living to work. My wife and I spend a lot more time volunteering money for charity. Over the following year, I want to tackle The North Coast 500 circuit, complete my MBA and a cycle challenge for the Stroke Association.
www.stroke.org.uk
Sophie Mclean
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules hereLast Updated:
Report this comment Cancel