Introduction

Hello and welcome to yet another chronicle by yet another unknown voice among millions. The only true difference that may separate me from the masses is that I am in fact a writer having been published before. While it was actually a short stint for a local newspaper my wife assures me that it still counts. Her exact words were, "Published is published my dear and that's what you always wanted, right?"
She is absolutely right and while I consider writing my central passion the goal of being published seemed a pipe dream until it actually happened.
This blog isn't about my quest for a Pulitzer prize for writing though. This blog is about a series of unfortunate events to use a familiar phrase.
Back in 2016 I suffered a stroke that forever changed my life in ways I could never have imagined. On the advice of a couple of close friends I began writing about my experiences concerning my recovery and subsequent path back to health and what could very loosely be called "normalcy".
The stroke hit me in my visual cortex, nearly blinding me but the physical effects, while minimal came with their own difficulties. In short, I was lucky to have come through it relatively unscathed in the larger picture. Now, nearly 7 months later, all that remains is my somewhat reduced visual acuity. The stroke effectively turned the brightness control on my vision down by about half and nearly destroyed my peripheral vision. The months since the stroke have been a focus on the painstakingly slow recovery of my vision. You see, I lost the ability to drive because as odd as it may seem, without peripheral vision, the state considers you unsafe on their roads. As a result I wait patiently for my brain to heal the damaged area or rewire around the damaged portion. I undergo regular and routine vision tests to gauge the amount of healing and what damage still remains.
For all the physical effects of the stroke there were also emotional and mental effects that have been just as challenging to deal with. I was emotionally unprepared for the feeling of being violated, changed that I was left with. I was "different" than before and could not deal with it at first. I was angry, confused, sad and most of all afraid. The fear was so overwhelming at first that I began to suffer from anxiety attacks of the most ferocious and debilitating kind that I found myself paralyzed in both social and home situations. Put bluntly, I was waiting for the next horrible thing to happen. I spent weeks waiting for the other shoe to drop and finally take the rest of me away. It's astounding what the primitive fear instinct can do to an otherwise rational, intelligent man. It can transform an otherwise happy, well adjusted person into a mass of anxiety always on the edge of panic. The emotional healing is at least as slow as my vision but with my vision I can actually sense the improvement day by day. Not so with the emotional healing. That seems stunted some days and other days it seems I am sliding backwards when I feel the fear grip me. This fear is something I've never experienced before and it comes on with such suddenness and ferocity that I am forced to make sure that I have a xanax close by to help push it back to a manageable level.
Fear has been my constant companion for the last 7 months. I spent most of my adult life a confident, self assured person and in the blink of an eye I was reduced to a nearly paralyzed mass of insecurity. It was if my self identity had been raped and left bleeding by the side of the road. I had been changed against my will and left a broken man. The things that I had clung to that had helped define my sense of self had been taken away from me and all that was left was this other person who couldn't seem to handle his emotions and didn't see all that well.
I still struggle daily with the fear although it is somewhat easier to deal with these days. Every day that goes by takes me one step further away from the life altering event that turned me into this other person.
I'm learning to incorporate this new person into who I am and slowly learning to adapt to his fears and his emotional chaos.
Small steps. Day by day.