Chapter 3a – The day of the Stroke (Stroke Recovery Story)

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The day of the stroke – the stroke itself. What happened? How did it happen?

So, in the last chapter I was talking about my life before the stroke so you kind of have an idea of what kind of life I had before the stroke and now, this is the story of the stroke itself and the recovery, how it happened and what really happened.

So, on Friday, I got to the office and I went to the baptismal tank that we were building and I noticed that my step was not really good. So I went into my office. I’ve been diagnosed with high blood pressure long ago. My first trip to Canada, I had to do a medical check and that was when I was at the age of 25 – just about 25 and I had to check my blood pressure. It was a bit high and the doctor then prescribed medication. When I got to Canada, I went to the doctor’s and they gave me that medication and I was using it for a while. And after a while, I discovered that if I would do exercises, it will go down. I went to see my doctor, they looked at that and it was alright but I was still kept on the medication. And I was using the medication – very little. The medication was called … And I was having to use 2.5mg and I was using it once every 2 days and the pleasure was fantastic.

After a while, I just kept on improving my lifestyle and measuring my blood pressure from time to time. Whenever I’m fasting, I discovered that it will be low and if I took the medication, it will really go low so I usually wouldn’t take it when I’m fasting especially when I’m doing long fasts. But what I didn’t notice was that as I got to 40, some things may have changed. I didn’t really measure my blood pressure during that particular fasting in April. And I still feel that maybe if I had done that, I could have noticed that it wasn’t going down and I would have kept on the medication. But anyway I have the medication in my bag and I took my medication that day and just kept on working but I noticed that my legs had tripped and I wasn’t feeling too well so I called my wife and said, “You know what? I’m feeling weird. Maybe, you gave me the bug that you have.” We laughed and that was it. And I went over. I was able to get up, I went over to the other pastor and heard the story of how they were in the meeting the night before and the storms came and the roof started shaking and it caved in and everybody was safe. Nobody was hurt and I was happy and prayed with them. I went to my neighbor’s and we were doing their school work and just talk to them. But while I was walking, each time I had to walk, I was noticing that my legs were getting a little bit weird. But I didn’t know that this was a stroke. I’m sharing this so that if anybody is experiencing this at another time, they will remember that I heard this story and maybe it’s stroke and they will do something about it. I kept on going and I kept on and I came back to my office, laid down, rested for a while, just laid on my couch [I have a couch in my office]. I just laid down for maybe 30 mins or 1 hour. And as I was doing that, I just felt a little bit better and then I will get up again and do some other things and pray and do some other things. And I kept on doing things – walking around, praying and the more… It started after a while. After about maybe an hour or two, I began to notice that I wasn’t feeling well in my hands also – just lightly. That’s what is so weird. I have heard about stroke before. There’s nowhere you… I think stroke is something that many people have heard about and all I knew about stroke was that it would happen suddenly and it will paralyze [that’s what I thought then] one side of the face or one side of the body. But this was just gradual. I just started feeling weird in my hands. I couldn’t pick it – what it was.

By evening, we had a prayer meeting at 6 o’clock and I think we’d pray at 5. So my wife must have come into the church by 5 o’clock. By the time she came in, I was standing up, I went to see her. I think she looked at my face and she noticed that things were not right. She was talking to my sister who’s a doctor and wondering but for me, I just kept on feeling weird and I started praying. I was praying and declaring that my body is well, I’m healed, I have strength in my hands, I recover my strength and that’s what I was just declaring. I recover my strength. I recover my strength in my hands. By then, it was becoming more pronounced that something was wrong with my right leg and my right hand. I couldn’t hold my iPad the way I would hold it. Not that it was not possible but I couldn’t hold it. And I started feeling a bit weak also – just internally weak. As I was doing all that, I was praying. It was time now for me to come, the Prayer Meeting, I always lead some part of it some other people will lead some other parts of it. And so they were leading their own part and after a while, they called me to do my part and I was able to do my part but I couldn’t finish it. By the time I was done with some of the prayers, I was tired. I had to go sit down and left then to finish the prayer. So my wife really was worried about it and around that time, I began to feel that this is a stroke and I didn’t want to make my wife panic.She also began to think it was stroke and she was wondering if it’s going to make it worse if she says something like that. It was getting dark already at that time – it was past 7 and we were thinking of going to… We didn’t have any registration with any hospital here in Nigeria and we didn’t know what to do. But my dad knows a doctor who owned a private hospital and that was a good hospital.

So, anyway, to cut the long story short, we went home. You know, we went home! We should have gone to the hospital but we went home and we were just wondering, “Will this reverse? Is this just a TIA [Trans Ischemic Attack] at this age and it’s so slow? Maybe it’s just going to reverse after 24 hours.” And we were thinking of all that but you know what? It was getting worse. Around 3 o’clock in the morning of Saturday on the 8th of April, it was already really bad. And my sister said we should get to the hospital as quickly as possible. We called the doctor and he says okay, he’s going to be there. He will come down right away and so we got a friend of ours. So, I got up. I wanted to go to the bathroom to ease myself and I did that. I needed to change into something different from my pyjamas to something I could go to the hospital with. And as I was about to pull that, it just hit me that you know what? You are becoming paralyzed. And I didn’t know any person that had recovered from stroke. So, it just dawned on me that I’m becoming weak and helpless. And at that time, it was too much for me and I just broke down and I was crying. Just sobbing. And my wife came and I just broke down and that was the first time in years… I can’t remember ever ever being broken like that. Since my mom died, I was never broken. I didn’t cry like that even when my mum died.

So, I think something was restored to me that day. I really do believe that because now I feel even more emotional. Something has happened to me. I feel that. So that happened and I think this is going to be a bit longer than the other chapters. Anyway, to cut the long story short, I eventually was able to put my pants on and put on a shirt and I got into the car and I was taken to the hospital. All along the way when people would call to pray with me, I will just begin to cry and tears will just be rolling down my eyes. And all I was thinking was that you know what? I can’t believe I’m on this side of the prayer because I have always been the one from a young age, praying with people. And I remembered the first time I prayed with this guy in my high school – secondary school and he just woke up from his sickness. So, I’ve always believed in Divine Healing and I enjoyed praying for people and seeing them healed. Some, it takes long. Some, not long. Some, they don’t get healed but the joy of just being able to stand with them, pray with them; the joy of seeing them recover, I always enjoyed that. But right now, I was the one being prayed for. And it was breaking me and lots of things were happening in my life. So, we went to the hospital eventually and I was told that this must be something blood related or stuff. Inmet the doctors and one said maybe the blood is in your brain already and there is pressure or something. I felt as if I was nauseous so they put me on a wheel chair, I had to get a CT Scan and eventually, I got the scan done. I’d gotten… there’s a lot of drama that happened in the hospital but anyway, cutting all that off, it was eventually done and I’m grateful to God that there was no rupturing. There was nothing in my brain. It was just a normal attack – ischemic stroke. That means there was no rupture, there was no haemorrhage.

It wasn’t a moragic stroke but the strange thing is that when I got to the hospital, the doctor that was me around for the CT Scan, said I should just be making fists with my fingers. And I could make fists with my fingers but it still kept on getting worse. I was in the hospital. They were doing all they could do but it kept on getting worse. I was put on some IV fluids and all that. And it still kept on getting worse. All of Saturday, I think, it kept on getting worse. I don’t know when the last point was when I couldn’t make any fists anymore. I couldn’t move my right hand, I couldn’t move my left hand, I couldn’t turn on the bed. I think [I’m not too sure of that because I didn’t take note of it]… I think that it ended on Sunday morning but it could have ended in the middle of the night while I was sleeping but I know that I kept on wishing that it’d stop, getting weaker but it kept on getting worse.

I knew that I was praying and things were getting worse, worse and worse and worse. But there was good news anyway and that’s what happened while I was dressing up. While I was dressing up and things were getting worse, I heard in my spirit. I felt the Lord say to me, “You will go through this and you will recover but you will become a different man.” I felt that in my spirit man and that helped me. That’s what I held onto and that’s what I’ve been holding on to all this while. I felt the Lord say to me, “You will go through this…” and I just knew that I was going to go through it and I will recover. And I had faith that I’d recover and when I will be recovered, I will be a different person. I really have changed in my worldview. If you look at me, of course I don’t look so different and I may not speak so different but inside, some things have happened and I’m really grateful to God for all that has happened. I really am grateful to God for my wife. My wife was there for me. She stood with me, did everything. By myself, I couldn’t eat. I wasn’t used to using my left hand to eat, I had to learn to use my left hand. Dressing up was difficult; turning in the bed was difficult. People in the church rose up and started helping me. They were always coming in and visiting me, brought fruits, lots of things – money, help and help just kept on pouring in. The Lord has blessed us by giving the church and the people in the church helped a lot. And I think I started physiotherapy on the 3rd day in the hospital.

So, maybe I should cut this chapter here so it’s not too long. I’ll talk about my stay in the hospital and my recovery in the next chapter. So, let’s stop it here and just say thank you for listening so far.