Lu Logic's Blog

FLATLINE… THE STROKE CHRONICLES. 

“Where others will not cross the line, the line is where I begin and cross over to start my journey.” 

SENSORY OVERLOAD:

“Sensory overload (sometimes abbreviated to SO), related to Cognitive load in general, is a condition where one or more of the senses are strained and it becomes difficult to focus on the task at hand. The term is commonly (but not exclusively) used in the context of autistic/spectrum disorders, though it may appear in neurotypical children. It may be necessary for only one sense to be bombarded by stimuli to affect that sense as well as the other senses and the thinking process. The most common type occurs when more than one sense is stimulated. For example, a person might be watching television when someone comes in and asks a question; the watcher might fail to respond because he or she simply does not register it, or realizes the question has been asked but gets confused and doesn’t know whether to answer the question or concentrate on the television.”

*The definition above is from Wikipedia. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Main_Page

“Before I go on with this post I must say that I am within my complete and fullest mental capacity at time of writing this blog post.”

Now that I had gotten my above disclaimer out-of-the-way I can continue on with what I wanted to talk about. For I did not want any of my friends or followers of my blog to think that I was having some sort of mental breakdown.

And what I wanted to talk about is I guess is the “sensory overload” of all the paperwork and documentation one has to go through with the medical provider, insurance, ones place of employment and so on. That can be at times feel like a full-time job it’s self.

It’s what one can say is part of the aftermath after having a traumatic medical event that nobody tells you about. Really… Nobody is going to tell you about the loads of paperwork you have to go through. They will tell you what happened to them, they might even tell you about the recovery progress.

Or they might even tell you (or the surviving family member will tell you…) the worse case scenario if the person of subject has passed away. But nobody will tell you about all the paperwork and procedures that you will have to subject yourself with.

Granted there is city/state and local services out their that will help you with the process, but even these agencies get the information or procedure wrong. And with that said, one is left down a path that will take you in the wrong direction.

Matter of fact I had a social worker at the hospital where I was staying at for three weeks, and she really made no effort in helping me with getting services. It felt like as if her main agenda was not to provide me any help with getting services. And even after multiple discussions I had with her, she always seem to make it a point do discourage me from getting services.

The oddest point for me with her was when I asked for the appropriate paperwork to full-out to get such services with these city/state agencies. She mentioned for me that she would get that for me. After a week of not getting any sort of reply I had tracked her down for a follow-up. And asked “Do you have the paperwork  for me that I need to fill out and submit?” She told me. “I will have that for you shortly.”

She got back to me two days later, directed me into an office. Pointed me to a computer, and told me. “You can go online and research that information yourself.” And then walked away.

*”Bitch is that not your job since I am in the hospital recovering from a stroke and temporally paralyzed on the right side of my body from a stroke?!”

* Granted… I have improved considerably since my hospital stay and I continue to improve with each day.

Odd but all true. In case you are wondering that person is.

Helen Katz-Golod, LMSW Social Worker for St. Luke’s Roosevelt Hospital located in New York, New York.

Let’s just say… I am giving you all a warning if you ever have to encounter her.

Now I am not being a drama queen when I said the following ”Bitch is that not your job since I am in the hospital recovering from a stroke and temporally paralyzed on the right side of my body from a stroke?!”

But lets talk about the later part of the statement above for a moment, just so you understand. “I am in the hospital recovering from a stroke and temporally paralyzed on the right side of my body from a stroke?!”

The definition of a stroke is the following.

“A stroke, also known as a cerebrovascular accident (CVA), is the rapid loss of brain function(s) due to disturbance in the blood supply to the brain. This can be due to ischemia (lack of blood flow) caused by blockage (thrombosis, arterial embolism), or a hemorrhage (leakage of blood). As a result, the affected area of the brain cannot function, which might result in an inability to move one or more limbs on one side of the body, inability to understand or formulate speech, or an inability to see one side of the visual field.”

*This definition above and image below is from Wikipedia. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Main_Page

The above image is a CT scan of the brain showing a right-hemispheric ischemic stroke (left side of image.) The photo above is NOT my actual brain scanned image, this is only being used as an example. And to give everyone an understanding of a stroke and what exactly it is.

At one point I thought to ask the following question to my twitter followers via my Twitter account at @LUIS_CASTRO_NYC  . The question was the following.

“Question… “What do you do when you are depressed, and need to get out of that mood?” Your answer could be posted on my next blog post.”

The reason I asked this is the simple fact that dealing with such an issue can be a depressing matter. And I actually had gotten the following replies back.

I have the best followers on Twitter I think. You just have to love technology and the Internet!