Light at the end of the Tunnel - I hope!

I think we are now coming out of what has possibly been the worst period since Pete had his stroke.  

He has been much happier these last few days and, at last, I think I am beginning to feel a bit better.  I lasted until Sunday on the instructions not to take medications unless I got worse, but by then although I didn't feel worse, I didn't feel any better so started on the antibiotics and steroids.  

With both of us being so miserable things were not improving, but following Pete's visit to Dr. Saunders he has picked up no end.  I think a lot of it was that she did a proper examination and seemed to want to get to the bottom of things and this made him feel that, at last, someone was trying to help him rather than just dish out tablets which was all his GP was interested in doing.  

Today Bev and Suzanne have both been to see Pete and both seemed pleased with his progress.  Bev especially was pleased to see the old Pete back as she saw him and referred him as she was worried about him.  Anyway today's session went well and she said, although he was a bit rusty, things were coming back.  She thinks it would be a good idea to make a couple of lists of words for Pete to refer to, but I would have to make him use them as he doesn't really connect to use lists to try and tell me something so would have to be prompted to do so.  We are starting to think now of useful words that he can point to - the first one is probably going to be 'greenhouse' as he likes to know that I have closed it up for the night! But I don't think we need too many words as then Pete would just opt out of using it all together!!  So that is our task for the next few days.

Suzanne was also pleased to see Pete and to hear things were a lot better - she had talked to Dr. Saunders and has also said she will have a word with her about the medication she prescribed.  It is really good to know we have such a caring community team who all communicate with each other and compare notes, very reassuring.

I told Suzanne about Pete walking on the side of his foot when going down steps and the way his foot swings right round, so off we went outside to demonstrate! She could easily see what I was talking about and thinks it is because Pete feels slightly unsafe as there is no rail or anything so is concentrating on not falling and keeping his balance.  She suggested he use the ankle brace to go up and down the steps as this will help his balance - the unevenness of the steps is quite challenging for Pete and he actually does very well - but he is not to do the steps on his own at the moment!  He is to keep up the walking in the house which is fine, his foot goes down flat inside which makes sense as he feels much safer.  It is just such a shame that, yet again, he can't actually explain how he feels when walking up and down steps and on different surfaces.

So, that is it for the moment - I feel there is light at the end of the tunnel at last after the worst of times.