10/15/2020- Day 4 Dodd Hall for Stroke Rehabilitation

Diagnosis: Cryptogenic stroke, cortical blindness- left hemianopia

Billy is still doing well, but did experience a few set backs. We knew this might happen eventually as his progress in recovery has gone at a rapid pace. He was told by his medical team today that the progress he’s made in 4 days usually takes a month or longer. Especially with the size of his stroke. When I saw the scan, I was shocked by how large the affected area was. They showed me the scan on day two and I didn’t want him to worry or feel defeated so I didn’t tell him how large the affected area truly was. Billy is ambidextrous, mostly left handed but also uses his right hand for many things as well. His medical team noticed this and asked him about it. He explained that when he was learning Japanese, they do not allow anyone to write with anything other than your right hand. The way Japanese is written and read is also from right to left on a page. This, in combination with prayer and all the love poured out over Billy these past few days, may explain how well he is recovering because he’s made many different connections in his brain already by using both the left side and the right side equally. He truly is a walking miracle 🥰

Today, his setbacks were mostly due to a disrupted circadian rhythm and because he worked hard with therapy. Last night, he was telling me that he experienced difficulty falling asleep because of the light from the television. I asked why he didn't just turn it off and he said it was because his roommate was watching television and he didn't want to disturb him. However, his roommate has his own television and is on the other side of the room. He struggled with processing this and relaying to staff that he needed help figuring out how to turn his television off. It was hard to see him struggle because he has shown many patients over the years how to work that same exact call button/television remote that is standard in most hospitals. Now, I was watching him analyze it as if it was a brand new device he had never seen or used before. As a result, he was mentally exhausted but trying to keep himself awake so that he wouldn't have problems sleeping/staying asleep tonight. Unfortunately, this caused his processing to slow and he was getting frustrated with himself. For example, he was trying to reply to text messages, but was having a difficult time identifying what he was seeing on the screen. He then ended up visibly frustrated with his speed and processing time. I helped him finish his text messages and he was grateful but you could tell he felt like he had let himself down by giving up a "simple" task. Then, he was trying to put his pants on too fast and hit his head on his bedside table because he forgot to check his vision field deficit before making quick movements. Lastly, when I walked from the bedside to the window to move my phone, my quick movement in the room caused him to see a trailing shadow of my body. By dinner time, I saw that he had very slight resting tremors in his hands. He then began to have the visual hallucinations again that I hadn't seen him have since his first over stimulated day. He asked me "Hun, who else is in the room with us." I asked him to describe what he was seeing and he stated "I see a girl standing behind you. She looks like you but a younger version of you. I think she looks like Annika." Then he realized what he was saying, shook his head, and said "I'm doing it again, aren't I?" So, I now know that he is overstimulated and mentally exhausted when he begins to see things that aren't necessarily there, but his mind seems to be trying to compensate for the vision field deficit in a bizarre manner. 

Today, not as much humor from him as he was tired and probably felt the exhaustion I was also feeling at the time. Tonight he asked his nurse to give him his melatonin early, I helped him turn off his television, and I brought one of my favorite cuddly blankets for him to sleep with that smelled like home. Tomorrow should be a better day and hopefully he can get some good sleep.

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