My Story (Part 2)

The Reality of Recovery

Grief and Legacy

From there, a grief began. Not just for my body, but for the life I had built and lost. In the early days, right after the stroke, every day is taken up with the medical.  But after the initial crisis, it becomes more about the mental challenge.  We are conditioned to think that medicine cures us.  But I was struggling with different issues.  I was alone, isolated and trying to make sense of what was happening to me.

My father died from a stroke at 55. When I was admitted, my husband called my mum to ask for his medical records. Was there a pattern? Something we’d missed? It brought everything back. Not just his death, but the sadness, the helplessness, the unanswered questions. I wasn’t just dealing with my own recovery anymore. I was staring down a family history no one fully understood.

The System Gap

This story isn’t about trashing the NHS. It saved my life. But once I was discharged, I entered a void. No roadmap and no handover, just a polite handoff to a GP who couldn’t access my data. I became my own project manager, therapist, caseworker. 

Endless referrals. Dozens of private specialists. Contradictory advice.

“Do more yoga.” …“Go back to normal.” … “Lose weight.”

A revolving door of scans, blood samples, neurological exams, but still no clarity. I requested my NHS notes and was sent a hefty 250 pages. Nurses had captured every moment. But the system that saved me had no infrastructure to support what came next.

A Family Transformed

And it wasn’t just me. The stroke hit my whole family. My husband became my advocate overnight - managing appointments, pushing me on walks when I couldn’t feel my left side, trying to follow doctors’ orders when they barely had time to explain them. 

My kids were young, confused, and scared. One day I was just “mum,” the next I was someone who couldn’t keep up, who snapped easily, who slept all the time. 

Everyone told them “she’s going to be okay,” but none of us really knew what “okay” meant anymore. We were all grieving — not just what happened, but who I used to be. And no one tells you how to help your family through that.