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Home / Thoughts / Bit of a scare

Bit of a scare

Written by Sean on Sunday, January 28, 2007

I recently spent a night in hospital under "observation". Towards the end of the day at work, my arm suddenly stopped working properly. It felt very "light", I had no real control over it, no strength in it either. My speech was slurred, I had a nasty headache, I was lightheaded. All signs of a stroke. My partner was prompt to get me to the hospital via ambulance.

MRI testing

Turns out it wasn’t a stroke. Glad of that. It was some rare form of migraine.

Poked and proded and neuro exams, tests and scans. But mostly, lay down and wait for the next hospital staff to come see you. It’s likely why you’re refered to as a "patient". Ohh, I can’t wait to be patient!

My partner worried. She said "you have to be careful what you wish for, you might get it but not quite". She was refering to wanting to be paralysed, but ending up with a half paralysed body, the right half, instead of the bottom half. She says she doesn’t want me to have to use a wheelchair, "one of those ones with the handles in the back because we’d have to push you, with your head lolling on one side, drooling". That satement was telling.

No, of course I don’t particularly want to have hemiplegia and lose control of my speech. I must admit, I was fascinated for that 30 or so minutes where I couldn’t use my right arm properly. I was typing, but fingers weren’t responding and it was both fascinating and frustrating. But it wouldn’t be the end of the world, would it? Highly ironic though that I’d be paralysed in a way I didn’t want to, but heck, that would be life.

Luckily, it’s not the case, and isn’t likely to be the case any time soon either.

Every time I end up in hospital though, I can’t help thinking "Oh I wish it was to treat an accute SCI that would leave me paraplegic".

So, yeah, I’m careful what I wish for. I’m very particular in what I wish…

[tags]Hospital, Migraine, Paraplegic, Scare[/tags]