My thoughts on the everydayness of life

John seems to have taken a some steps backwards this weekend, his language has been worse, he's been saying the wrong words and stuttering on occasions. We took John's mum to get a laptop, John was getting confused with Argos's computer and struggled to order it. When we got back to her house we had to sort out her broadband, he found the computerised answer phone really confusing and got quite upset. Generally John has had a lower level of functioning and has been more irritable. This could be due to tiredness and so John is not going to increase his working hours this week. We are also going to try to make time for all the therapy. it is difficult because John is very tired. We knew the return to work would bring a lot of challenges and so it hasn't come as a surprise, but we both find it difficult when John seems to go backwards.

John is learning the clarinet, because he was learning the euphonium before the stroke, but sadly the euphonium makes John's head hurt. Overall monday went well, John managed to discuss a complex issue through with colleagues. He has come across a few issues that he needs to work on. Colleagues send updated round using bullet points and John found he couldn't work out what they meant. He is going to speak with each person to try and work it out, John's language difficulty still has an effect on his life, he often says the wrong words and finds using the phone more difficult than speaking face to face. He still has to work at his written English and his reading isn't as fluent as it was. The wonderful thing is that his logic, reasoning and maths is unaffected, which means he can still do his job. God is good and kind in all his dealings. We are continuing with therapy when John is home which John still needs to maintain the gains. John is so happy to be able to return t...

One of the difficulties with stroke recovery is the plateau period. This is the period that follows the rapid progress of the first 6 to 9 weeks. John has moved into this stage where he feels he is working hard just to maintain the gains and is not appearing to make any further progress. This is a natural part of the recovery process, John will still make gains, but they will be less discernable and much slower. He has to keep working himself very hard but without the reward of obvious gains. We value your prayers for this time because John has also started his phased return to work and so can become tired and is already finding it difficult to fit everything in. It can take many years to gain all the skills you had previously, but each step takes a lot of effort. A lot of experts claim that gains are only made in the first 6 to 8 weeks and then there is no more progress. One can see how it is tempting to believe this because the gains slow down and indeed appear to come to a halt. H...

Just a short update for our praying friends. John has been very tired today, he had three hours in work on Monday and yesterday and again tomorrow. We have been keeping the therapy going, so yesterday John worked on the exercise bike, the balancing board, audiblox and Keda reading. he has also become a Soduko fan. He went into work and attended a board meeting where the chair welcomed him back but he was there just to observe. John came home and was very upbeat because he was happy to see everyone. Today however he has been very tired. He did the exercise bike and balancing board and had to take the car for its mot. When he got back he had a go at compublox. But after that he fell asleep for a lot of the afternoon. He went to the prayer meeting tonight and struggled to keep awake. John suffers with insomnia, his legs are very painful due to diabetic neuropathy which often keeps him awake. We would value your prayers as he gets used to work and keeping the therapy going. His poor brai...

There was a knock on the door and Alice answered, she came in with the most beautiful flowers saying they were for Sylvia. It was a lovely surprise, John's work colleagues had sent them.

It was very emotional for John today, he found people were very kind and happy to see him. His language was poor for the first hour or so but then it did come back. He found everyone very supportive. He is very very tired tonight but that is to be expected. He is back on work on Wednesday for another three hours so he has tomorrow to rest.

This afternoon John is spending 3 hours in work. He has been a little anxious but has gone. We spent the morning getting John's brain into gear, he did his usual exercise bike and balancing board. We then did some speech therapy and audiblox. Please continue to pray for John that he will not get too tired and will have time to continue with the brain work. Here is John doing speech therapy while Alice practices her trumpet. All ready for work.

We had a lovely time today with out friends who travelled a long way to see us. John really enjoyed the day. John has taken up Sudoku, he likes to stretch his brain and it has become a passion. He feels he has to keep stretching his brain because it makes him feel more alive. I have an interesting link on changes to white brain matter you can read about it here:_ http://blogs.dnalc.org/g2conline/2009/10/19/white-matter-matters/

I thought I would write a short blog on the impact that my therapy is having upon me. Each morning I begin with 30 minutes on the exercise bike and a session on the balancing board. This gets my brain working up well in the morning. I find that if I miss this, e.g. on the Lord’s Day, my reading and language is significantly more sluggish. Consequently this will have to be a permanent part of my daily routine, or at least for 12 months. After this I complete my Speech Therapy tasks as agreed with my therapist. So far, predominantly, this has been centred upon word finding. In one sense it appears very straight forward, e.g. Opposites, Verb associations and such like. However, my ability to remember and use language in even fairly simple language has been considerably reduced. This can be quite humbling, as I used to have a very wide ability to use language. I have also lost my ability to spell and this has also been challenging. For someone who has always had ability to write...

John has made a lot of progress, I thought I would share some of the things we are doing now. There are a few amusing photos. In this exercise John has to read the letters and move the arm up, down, left right according to the letter for example "b" would involve holding the left hand up while you say the letter, whereas "q" would involve putting the right hand down as you say the letter. All this is done while marching and you say the letter on the second step. We have done a similar thing with arrow only saying up, down ,left right as you move your arm to match the arrows. John has got up to 10 blocks, the idea is that you show the patters of blocks for the number of seconds that there are blocks and then you cover them and John has to remember the pattern. John's short term memory was badly affected after the stroke and this has really helped. The next step in this programme is to remember lists, in these photos John is remembering all the Kings a...

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We saw our GP this morning and he has signed for John to start a staged return to work. He felt it was the right thing so long as John still has time to continue with his home therapies. We still see a drop in John's language if he doesn't get through all the work. John also visited the counsellor this afternoon, it is clear that John is going to have to change his life and the way he manages his workload in the future. She said he must learn to manage his time better and must be able to say no more often. This has always been something John has found difficult and it will be his biggest challenge yet. She went through John's whole medical history and said he would kill himself or have another stroke or heart attack if he carries on the way he has before. We know we are in God's hands, and our days are numbered. Yet we must also heed warning and take care of ourselves. God brings people into our lives and he uses means for our own good, John really wants to make these ...

This evening was the last of our week of prayer. Each year we have this week at the start of the year at which one of the brethren will give a twenty minute word of encouragement. In the past I have always been one of those men who are able to speak and these have been very blessed times. Because of the Lord's dealings over these last weeks, this year I was unable to preach. It has been a tremendous time of great blessing to all who have attended and I have been humbled particularly by the love heard by God's people for His great thankfulness to us as my progress has been so meteoric. On Thursday Ben preached on 1 Corinthians 1 on the ways of God's ways compared to men's and it was particularly helpful. As we prepared to pray I asked if I might just speak for 5 minutes to our dear folk of what the Lord has done. In the afternoon we had a visit from the Occupational Therapy doctor. She was sent by my employer to assess my current position and likely work return d...

John is so happy, he phoned dvla today and they said he could start driving again if his Doctor said it was ok. John phoned our Doctor and he said yes. John actually exclaimed Hallelujah on the phone to the receptionist. He feels so glad to be able to take himself out without someone having to drive him. It will also make the staged return to work so much easier. God is so good and we are so undeserving. Our Pastor asked John if he would preach in February and John said yes, we would value you prayers for this because this is a big first step, but John feels he should and the Lord will enable him to do it. I can only watch in wonder as I see John's staggering progress.

John is really pleased to be getting back to work, he is really excited about the prospect, if not a little anxious and afraid. He has been working this morning and has been getting back to normal activities. I thought you would like to see some photos.

We saw the speech therapist yesterday and she was very encouraging. She really felt John had made a lot of progress since before she saw him just before Christmas. She was very supportive of the idea of John having a staged return to work. She also seems to be a Christian, before Christmas she said she went to Church as well. Yesterday she was asking how John was getting on with reading and studying the Bible and listening to sermons. She suggested he listen to some sermons on sermonaudio and try to write down the main points. She then said he should try to summarise the sermon for someone else the next day. She also suggested he try to prepare a 15 minute sermon that will help to get him back into studying the Bible again.How amazing to find a speech therapist who is so helpful. Today John phoned a counsellor that work uses to help employees with anxiety issues, anxiety makes John's language and angina worse. He needs to learn how to manage his anxiety. He phoned this lady this a...

We have been working so hard today, my head is wrecked, and John is exhausted, he has gone up for a sleep. John seems to have gone up a gear the last few days, he got up to memorising 8 coloured blocks, which is probably more than most people can do. We have been working on English, comprehension and grammar. John is speeding through the Keda reading programme, we have finished level 1 and will start level 2 tomorrow. We did audiblox and went onto level 4 sequencing exercise, John could remember most of the monarchs of England, the books of the Bible, the planets in the solar system. He has been learning the names of the children on Jacob in order. He has also finished all the speech therapy work which involved pages of writing, he hated it but worked through it.We see the speech therapist tomorrow. He is still doing the exercise bike and the balancing board. John phoned the Stroke Association help line today to ask advice about returning to work. Shockingly only 17% of young (under 6...

I have been working on my OU Autistic Spectrum Disorder today, it has been hard to concentrate on it with everything that has happened. The deadline for the cumputer marked assessment was the 6th so I thought I had better get down to it. I found it very interesting I was learning about the various theories for the cause of autism. One of the things I learnt was that people who have temporal lobe damage and people who have dementia often experience the same difficulties as poeple who have autism. We have been very conscious of this since John had the stroke, but it is interesting to have your own observations confirmed. This would also explain why a lot of the things we have done with Alex have helped John.

We brought in the new year quietly last night, we listened to some old songs on spotify, Paul Robeson and songs from musicals and Flanders and Swan.I think they triggered a lot of memories for John and he seemed to remember a lot of the words. Ben hasn't been well with an awful cold. 2011 under God will bring many changes for our family, Naomi will God willing get married, Alex will be 18 and Esther 13. Our family is growing up, it is an exciting time mingled with fear and some anxiety for the future and how everything is to be done. We must try to not let the work and fear rob us of the happiness and spoil our last year with Naomi still living at home. I think Ben has chosen a wonderful verse for this new year. "The heavens are the work of Thy hands... as a vesture shalt Thou change them, and they shall be changed: But Thou art the same, and Thy years shall have no end. The children of Thy servants shall continue, and their seed shall be established before Thee." Psa...