How I found something beautiful in a crazy mess

“When you are this far down, the only way to go is up.” ~Florence Dunklee

If you read my last post, I was going on about that disastrous day that I saw my first rehabilitation centre. Actually, I am grateful for that day. 

It brought me a lot of pain but it also lit something in me, like a big bonfire of tenacity, waiting for me to recognize its power.  

It was anything but easy. At this time of my life, my head was foggy. I could not speak. And once I turned away the suggestion of the “normal” rehabilitation route, it felt like I was alone, situated in a big black hole of dark confusion. 

You see, culturally in Japan there is no place for those who question people of authority. 

As the doctors proposed the one thing that they proposed to all people who have a stroke, they seemed as if they were out of options for me, as if my reasonable questions suddenly hit deaf ears. 

Although they perhaps would have liked to help me out, they seemed incapable.

It’s like a wall is built around their version of the truth. Everything inside that wall works like a dream. You don’t ask questions. You simply accept their version of the truth, as your truth.  So, you have a stroke - you go to rehab. 

But here’s the thing, the doctors perhaps didn’t see me coming. 

I was a foreigner. I was young. And I was taught that from early on, if you don’t like the situation, then change it.

So I would like to think that they wanted to help me, but instead (because, let’s face it I was something outside of that wall) they just wanted nothing to do with me. 

You can imagine my discomfort with the situation, can’t you? 

I was devastated by the notion that I had asked too many questions about my recovery. Hard questions. Outside the wall questions. And this from a perspective that was foreign to most, basically caused them to throw their hands up in the air. 

I had a stroke. I was in a foreign land. No one understood me. You see, that left me in a pickle.  

So, a plan started brewing in my head. If I didn’t go to the rehab, could I make the rehab come to me?

Mind you, at that point I was three weeks post stroke. My head was not clear, in fact I couldn’t remember my address or the names of my children. 

In fact, the only thing I could count on was that I was consistently inconsistent. I referred to myself as he and my husband as I. And the funny thing about it? I could say it differently each time I spoke.

I saw the problem at hand, and even through my fog I realised that none of my doctors knew me or could find a solution that worked for me. But, by kicking me out of the hospital they were setting me up to figure it out on my own. 

They didn’t know how it made me feel to be lost, abandoned in a city that wasn’t home to me. The feeling of desolation crept over me and sat there, just sat there begging me to not let it overtake me. 

This was an extremely grim and bleak moment. A moment of extreme adversity.

It was a moment in which I saw the obstacles facing me. 

Obstacles that I couldn’t do anything about. 

A moment to take stock of my situation. 

And precisely the moment that I, being a strong willed, fire-eater of a girl, always took matters into my own hands. 
And this time was no different. 

The stroke didn’t take that away from me. My scrappiness, my determination and, above all, my will. 

You see, that big bonfire of tenacity surfaced in the most serendipitous way. It was like something awoke in my soul, urging me to recognize the power I have. Power over myself and the ability to impact everything that happens to me. 

It is like coming out of a deep, dark, cozy slumber. This urge, the scent, awakes your basic instincts. My basic instincts were screaming, “Wake up! Smell the coffee! And get on with it!”. 

This was a defining moment of my stroke and my life, albeit one that I only considered today. 

I was many things to many different people before my stroke. I was a wife who gave up her business and moved the whole family to Tokyo, in support of her husband. I was a mother who gave it my all, from organising school charity events, to sitting in the bleachers watching (yet another) football game to my newly found habit of cooking up a storm each night. 

After my stroke, I was simply a survivor. 

Of all the things that my stroke took away from me; my stories, my voice and a certain wind from my sails; it was here, at this moment that I realised my fire. 

I was a creator. 

I was a creator. Now I had to find a way to harness my forces and forge ahead. Could I get my team on board? Would I be safe? Could I build a programme of therapies? How would a woman without her voice accomplish this? 

Til next time,

Sx

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