Lifetime Lessons Of Gratitude, Courage, Love, And Letting Go.
May 29th, 2009 - Trophy Club, Tx
On April 20th 2009 a blood vessel in my head broke open and my brain began to bleed.
Commonly known as a stroke, and considered deadly, this brain blood leak changed my life forever.
I had been asked by an artists friend to pose for a quick sketch portrait to help work her technical drawing skills. I was sleepy to start and had been nursing a headache for a couple of days. I fell asleep on her couch immediately.
Three weeks later I received the above portrait in my email inbox. Counting backwards I figured out that the image above was captured on the first day of my stroke. You are looking at a portrait of me meeting my stroke for the first time.
Not knowing who or what my “stroke” was. ignored it’s slight pain and dizziness until
“Le Stroke” stopped me from getting out of bed. I was discovered by family and spent the next week in an Intensive Care Unit learning about loss. Body loss, freedom loss, and the loss of personal dignity.
Next for me was something called “Rehab”. The sign on the building read “Interlochen Health and Rehab” made it sound “organic,California healthy.”
What I discovered was that my next month was to be spent inside my oldest and deepest fear because Interlochen was a in actually a nursing home.
America is afraid to die. America’s deepest fear is to waste away alone in a nursing home.
So I begin what's to be the most important part of my stroke rehabilitation, helpless with p, ruled by a blood pressure that does circus-dog tricks inside my body, I face the fear of both my mortality and the unknown of Interlochen,my “Death House” nursing home.
What I found here is hope, passion,and the very essence of what the word family means.. The eyes of resident her shine with the very soul of our parents who lived on this earth before us
I have discovered lives of great dreams reached and lost, terminal lives filled with hope for a new day and new America. Ocean deep despair at our health system and at the same time, expressions of pure awe at modern medical technology..
There are” diamond life lesson 2 b learned here,as there is with anywhere in the world where life is precious.broihier This book is not only created for the Resident, but also for the professionals who care for them.broihier CARE DIEM & MUCH ALOHA
to them all
Dr Earp RM 313