World Stroke Day

It’s World Stroke Day, and I’ve been living with the aftermath for nearly six years now.

Here’s something most people don’t realise about stroke recovery: you can look completely fine whilst your brain and body are doing something entirely different.

I have permanent double vision. Every single thing I see, I see twice. I wear glasses with one lens frosted over to reduce the visual noise. Reading, looking at my kid’s face, navigating a shop. All of it requires constant mental adjustment. There’s no surgery that can fix it without risking worse complications, so this is just how I see the world now.

The thing is, unless you notice my glasses, you wouldn’t know. I’ve learned to navigate it well enough that most people have no idea. But it’s exhausting in ways that are hard to explain. My brain is constantly working to make sense of what I’m seeing, and by the end of most days, I’m done.

Then there’s the memory. I can tell you the same story twice and genuinely think it’s the first time I’m sharing it. Two weeks of my life after the stroke just don’t exist in my memory at all. I was conscious, I was talking, but I have no recollection of any of it.

Stroke recovery isn’t about bouncing back. It’s about adapting to a new normal that most people can’t see.

If you know someone who’s had a stroke, remember this: just because they look fine doesn’t mean everything’s back to how it was. Be patient. Be kind. And know that what someone needs on one day might be different the next.