When I was a senior in high school, my parents and I visited my grandma in West Virginia. The plan was to stay for a week before driving, via rental car, to Boston, on a quest to scope out potential colleges. I'd somehow wedged into my mind this grand, magnificent idea that Boston, Massachusetts was as far as humanly possible -- physically and also culturally, socially and with regard to landscape and climate -- from my Southern Oregon upbringing; therefore, Boston was where I wanted to go.
On the morning we were to leave, my grandma very matter-of-factly informed us that she was having a stroke (she was a nurse -- she knew the symptoms). She then insisted she would be just fine, that she'd call her friend Susan and have her take her to the hospital, and that we should not let this alter our plans in any way and we should give her a hug and be on our way.
My mom, obviously, didn't go for this. She stayed behind as my dad and I continued the trek to Beantown. My grandma recovered relatively well from her stroke, although she still -- eight years later -- suffers from aphasia, where she simply cannot place her finger on the words she's trying to think of.
"You know -- that one thing?" is a common quote of hers.
This is usually met by: "A cat? Lasagna? Double-decker bus? Petunias? Fishing pole?" until as last, some member of the family triumphantly stumbles across the correct word or phrase.
The morning after Christmas, my grandpa (this time on my dad's side) suffered a stroke. He, much like my grandma had, remained calm and claimed to be fine, to the point he insisted he was, in fact, perfectly capable to drive himself home. A struggle ensued. He reluctantly gave in just enough to allow my grandma to drive him; however, he convinced her to drive home instead of to the hospital, which resulted in a several-hour delay in medical treatment.
His memory could come back, but for now he doesn't seem to remember colors, animals, locations...or his sons or granddaughters.
Strokes are a strange beast. They have the facade of being quiet, innocuous threats, calmly inhabiting their victims. "I'm having a stroke now," I remember my grandma saying, as if she were announcing, "I'm putting sugar in my tea" or "I need to weed my garden." It's eery to me, the calm that it evokes.
Because the underlying damage it is causing is neither calm nor harmless -- it is dangerous and life-altering. We're able, as a family, to laugh at some of the effects it has had on my grandma, specifically her penchant for adding extra zeros to numbers now -- "Really, a 220-pound turkey for Thanksgiving? Wow, Grandma, that is big!"
Somehow, I doubt I'll be able to see the humor if my grandpa doesn't remember who I am and more importantly, if he can't remember his own children. Somehow, this story started the same, but the outcome is looking very different.
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