CHAPTER 3. THE RABBIT HOLE.
Down in the rabbit hole, there was no concept of time. There was no understanding of night and day. I have no memory of the days turning into weeks. I slept when I wanted and ate what I wanted, when I wanted. (Dieting doesn’t exist either in the rabbit hole and I gained a lot of weight -more on that to come.) My husband Jamie wasn’t able to take time off work to keep an eye on me. I was, therefore, left to my own devices to fend for myself. At this time I was too ill to care, too fragile, too numb to be actively depressed about my new way of life. My friend described me as like being a rabbit in the headlights in that first couple of months. I was in a state of shock and the only things I remember from that time are the nightmares.
Days after the Stroke, without any warning, the nightmares arrived. They were constant. They were like torture being delivered directly inside my brain. I would often wake up crying in my sleep, sweating profusely. I felt like a two-year-old again, the girl with ‘monsters under her bed’.
Of course, the monsters didn’t live under my bed — they were inside my head, inside my stroke brain to be precise. They would come out to play when I was sleeping and terrify me. It exaggerated the already dream-like state I was already living in and they shattered me even more than the actual stroke did.
Jamie said they didn’t sound that bad but it to me they felt so real and something I couldn’t control.
I soon become increasingly tired and anxious. I desperately needed to sleep only to be often awoken from yet another nightmare. To exasperate the situation my tiredness made everything feel very loud. I was desperate for a little peace and quiet.
Some days were ‘clear’, and some were ‘foggy’; it was as if I was looking at the world through broken glass. Some days, I could barely lift my head off the pillow. It was as if it was made out of lead; physically too heavy to carry around. I had no routine, no structure. I was free-falling down into the depths of the rabbit hole.
Day-to-day dressing became exhausting for me. It’s not that I was unable to dress per se- it was the conscious decisions of the routine and the order of dressing oneself. It was complicated and taxing on my stroke brain. I could do it, but it was a laborious task. Big questions ran through my brain such as, ‘Knickers first or bra first? And then when do I put my socks on? And — remind me — what a ‘matching outfit is?’ As for shoes, having to figure out which was my left foot and which was my right proved to be an even bigger challenge.
About after a week of feeling completely overwhelmed by the whole dressing situation, I decided to give up on the idea of dressing myself and decided to wear my pyjamas instead. I hoped that it would all just go away on its own.
I did not want to see anyone. I began to refuse invitations to go out. I felt ashamed and embarrassed by this ‘stupid stroke’. This stroke made me look stupid. I rationalised to myself that if I didn’t see anyone, then the difficulties I was having post stroke couldn’t be real as no one had seen them.
One day; my dear friend who is an ex-Marie Curie nurse, ‘popped over to see me’ uninvited. She instinctively knew that I was choosing to retreat from the world. I grumpily let her in, and I flopped back down on the sofa.
‘Go and get dressed Sophie and we’ll go for a walk.’
‘NO.’
‘YES’
‘You go. I stay here.’ I glare at her, wanting her to go away and to leave me alone.
‘WHEN did you last have a shower?’
‘Never mind, you.’
‘Go upstairs, have a shower, get dressed and then we’ll go outside. Don’t make me come upstairs and give you a bed bath because I will! You can shower perfectly well. You didn’t lose the use of your arms.’
‘Fuck you. Fuck off!’
My friend stood there calmly looking over me as I lay on the sofa. She began to laugh and wagged her finger at me.
‘Ooo….just two fucks today is it? On Tuesday it was four fucks. We must be feeling a little better, today? So today is the perfect day to have a shower and GET DRESSED.’
I stared at her in disbelief, and I was also angry at myself for having snapped at her like that. She is one of the kindest and warmest souls I have ever met, and I love her dearly. She calmly returned my stare with a bemused, loving smile on her face. I could see I wasn’t going to win this one. I admitted defeat and did what I was told. I had a shower and got dressed. As we slowly walked through the winter park next to my house, I began to cry. We sat down on the cold, wooden park bench as I sobbed on her shoulder.
‘I AM BROKEN. MY BRAIN IS BROKEN.’ She held me tight and let me cry.
‘YES. Broken a little bit, for now, but broken things can mend. You’ll see.’
I had a concentration span of a fruit fly. 2017 wasn’t the year to be holding heavy debates with me such as Trump’s Presidency or Brexit. Sometimes I could barely remember to stay awake or even remember what my name was. Everything needed to be presented to me slowly, calmly and gently so my temporarily ‘out of order’ brain could comprehend it and not get frightened.
Talking of broken brains here’s an example of my forgetfulness; one time my husband came home from work to find every saucepan on the stove. A packet of flour had been spilt but not cleaned up. The oven was on, but nothing was inside, and I had random ingredients strewn all over our kitchen. My husband found me upstairs in the bedroom playing with our cat. When he asked me what I had been trying to cook, I stared at him blankly. I had no recollection that I was even in the kitchen.
To this day, we have never been able to figure out what I was attempting to cook. There was a recipe book out which was a farce in itself as I couldn’t even follow recipes at that time. In the past, I could imagine the steps in my head as I read the recipe, but back then I wasn’t able to see it in my mind’s eye for a while after the stroke. I couldn’t follow it.
I tried to pick myself up and pretend that everything was ‘fine’ and ‘normal.’ After about 6 weeks had passed I invited my beautiful ex-Marie Curie nurse friend to my home for dinner.
I insisted that I was going to cook a new recipe for us to try. I wanted to pretend that there was nothing wrong with me. Sadly, while attempting to prepare this dish, I left out so many of the ingredients; my friend ended up stepping in and cooking the supper pretty much herself. She sat me down at the kitchen table, while I blubbed and kept telling her, repeatedly, that I wasn’t stupid. I must be so, very ‘tired’.
My poor husband didn’t know what to do with me. He began to clean, as this was something he could control and make better. By the first week, the house was super-clean, by week number two we could have been featured in a Dettol commercial. Our home was immaculate; it sparkled. By the time we had reached the third week, my husband had started to throw out old clothes that I still wore! He couldn’t sit still. He didn’t know how to ‘fix’ me.
Like Humpty Dumpty, I had had a great big fall. My husband was terrified that all the kings’ horses and all the kings’ men wouldn’t be able to put my brain back together again.
What I now realise is that when you have a stroke; people are desperate to try and “fix” you. Not being able to fix someone takes its toll on the friends and family of the sick person. Jamie took to drinking daily little ‘snifters’ of Gin. Day by day, the bottle went down. Every week, the old bottle of gin was replaced by a brand new bottle. The poor bloke drank enough gin in that first couple of months to sink a ship! It was so out of character for him as he only occasionally drinks alcohol.
The months passed and before we knew it, Spring arrived in the month of April. The wind was to blow from a new direction, and things were going to take a turn for the better.
‘Winds in the East, mist coming in. Like something is brewing and about to begin’…
If you’d like to find out what happens next here is the link to Chapter 4.
