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Stroke Diary

Week Two - Back Home

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A week exactly after the stroke I went home. I was still not very with it, but it was great to be in my own house and my own bed. Problems at this stage were:

  • Numbness, primarily on my right side, on my back, around my hip, on my thigh and, for some reason, in my left calf.
  • A feeling as if I was getting cramp in one or both calves, even though the muscles there were completely relaxed.
  • Severe headaches
  • Poor spacial awareness - so I kept bumping into things, like door frames
  • Dizziness - more or less continuously
  • Tiredness - so I was having to take naps during the day, which I've always hated doing
  • Pain down the back of both legs when getting out of bed
  • Weird audio effects - as well as significant levels of tinnitus I found that higher pitches, especially female voices, came late to my left ear, so I got an echo effect and some music sounded out of tune, especially piano based stuff (BBC Radio Cambridgeshire's standard jingle for example sounded horrible)

The headaches in particular were bad news and we spotted a link with the anti-seizure drug they had prescribed me phenytoin): within an hour of taking it I had a thumping headache. A search on the web suggested this is a known side effect It took Beth over a day to get someone from Addenbrooke's to talk to us, and what did they say ... "it's your GP's responsibility now, you need to talk to him". Arrgghhh!!!

Our GP, when I phoned him, had heard nothing about what had gone on at all yet but he as quick to get going, had a prescription (for carbamazepine, under the wonderful brand name "Tegretol Retard") ready for us that night and saw us the following day for a long chat. He wondered if I really need to be on carbamazepine as the seizure was probably "provoked" by the angiogram (that's what he will tell the DVLA anyway!) but he's going to keep me on it for 28 days.

Written 17/02/02

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