FROM A STROKE SURVIVOR: I FOUND HOPE IN ADVERSITY

From being a bed-ridden person to moving into a wheelchair, to a walker, and now finally, walking with a cane... life teaches you many lessons

- Sameer Bhide

I WAS BORN in Pune and grew up in Mumbai and have been residing in the USA for the past thirty years. I had achieved the quintessential American dream — worked for many global companies for 24 years, including a respectful job with a reputed consulting firm like Grant Thornton LLP, a loving family with a wife and two sons, a beautiful house, sports car and a comfortable lifestyle.

I was 47 and reasonably healthy. And then, one fine day, without any warning or premonition, my life changed forever! I suffered an extremely rare catastrophic haemorrhagic stroke in cerebellum almost four years ago. After the stroke, two brain surgeries, and a month in a medically induced coma, life as I had known, built, came crashing down, from life-changing debilitating illness to the loss of work, and finally a divorce.

I had a rare congenital cerebral vascular abnormality (cavernoma) that affects a small population in the US. According to the Handbook of Neurosurgery by Dr Mark S. Greenberg, this abnormality develops in about 3,300 to 58,800 people in the US. And even rarer are the chances of it developing in a haemorrhage —only about 86-1,730 people per year, most of whom die in the process. I happened to be in this rarest of rare category, to have a condition, to have it develop into a haemorrhage and to survive the fatal stroke.

Since 2017, I have tried many therapies and treatments, to help me heal my mind, body and spirit. Immediately after the stroke, the left side of my body had become extremely weak and I suffered from severe headaches, dizziness, balance issues and nystagmus. Luckily, my cognitive abilities were intact. I embarked on a very strict rehab programme which included physical, occupational, and speech therapy sessions which gradually helped me regain some strength.