Don't you, forget about me

Everyone is moving on, and I'm still standing still. Everyone is out conquering the world, but the world is still conquering me. Everyone is living their lives, but I still am struggling to have a life. Part of me is happy that all my friends and family are insanely successful, but it makes being here at home really lonely. I'm scared that with everyone moving on, they will forget about me. I don't always hear from people, so maybe some of them have already forgotten about me. I don't think I'm really forgettable, and maybe people are too busy or too scared to be in my life, but isn't that just as bad? It still leaves me feeling alone. I mean, I don't blame people. If I was living my life successfully, I would be hard presssed to stop and turn around to look back at a friend I left behind. I know my story is really sad, so maybe it's hard for people to even think about it because it's just too sad. But when people visit me, I am so overcome with happiness to see them that I'm all smiles and ignore that big elephant in the room. Most of the time, I try to put on a happy face when people are around, well, some of the time. Now I don't talk about this much because it is kind of humiliating. But when I had the stroke, I lost the ability to inhibit my emotions(Pseudobulbar affect). So, even if something is a little bit funny, I laugh, and if something is a little sad, I cry. If I get a little frustrated, I also cry. When I start crying in front of someone, I then get mad at myself, which makes me cry more. Then I get scared that I'm scaring them away, and that makes me cry even more. So it's an awful cycle that I try my hardest to fight. The last thing I want to do is scare people away. It has slowly gotten better, but it's still another obstacle I am forced to deal with. But i don't need people to visit me, i just want people to know it's still me. I want people to be comfortable enough to just email me or just send me a little message. I know that is hard because i type slowly, so i don't always reply. But i'm there and i'm listening. I am amazed at the strength, loyalty, and care some of my friends show me on a daily basis. I can't believe they can face me with all my sad problems, and actually be there for me. I am so surprised by their bravery in standing by my side and supporting me. Like Rajul, for example, who is my number one fan, supporter, cheerleader, and angel(it is funny because I think she fulfilled that role long before my stroke). Or Chaya, who is strong enough to talk to me about some of the hard stuff and shares with me her concerns as well as her love. Or Nisha, who makes feel like I'm the only girl in the world, hehe. But for
real, she shows me endless happiness, fun, and love. Or my wifey, aka Krishna, who is always there to share everything with me. Or many, many more unbelievable friends. Or my brother, Anand, who is my ultimate best friend and hero. I need them in my life to remind me I'm not alone. I need them in my life to remind me that things will get better. I need them in my life to remind me that I am still needed. And most of all, to prevent what I'm most scared about, I need them in my life to make sure I don't forget myself.

Still Fighting It

"To live doesn't mean you're alive"
- Nicki Minaj

In every sense of that phrase, I died on November 29th, 2008. But sometime in December 2009, over a year after my stroke, I finally felt, quite simply, alive. Even though, it was only for a few moments, it felt so real to feel something other than powerless and useless. But a lot had happened in a year to lead up to that feeling. So, ever since the first day of my stroke, I had let the nurses get me up out of bed, and I did whatever my therapists wanted me to do. Though I was broken inside and out, I still did all I could to work hard. Some nurses and Doctors were destroying every hope I had that I would get better, but my family and other doctors were adamantly telling me I was going to be fine. Though I was utterly confused and pretty hopeless, I knew deep down there was a small chance my family would be right and everything would slowly come back. So, through blood, sweat, and many, many, many tears, I fought every day, even when I left the hospital, I didn't skip a beat in my therapy. I started physical, occupational, and speech therapy three times a week plus whatever I could do at home. My therapists and I quickly realized this wasn't enough for me, I needed time, creative approaches to therapy, and to strengthen each of my muscles before hoping any of them would be of any use. So my doctor mentioned that maybe I should look into another place called Race To Walk. Now, the name itself brought hope and excitement to my eyes, but I didn't want to get my hopes up, only to be disappointed for the one millionth time in the past year. So I started working out at Race To Walk twice a week without any expectations. Within the first few moments, I noticed the dedication of the owner and trainers there, the amazing equipment and machines that filled the place, the creative and new ideas that the trainers had, the hope and positive attitude of all the trainers and clients that seemed to seep into every corner and engulfed me completely. And finally, I noticed that little feeling inside me like the sun was finally rising out of every inch of my body that had only seen darkness for the last twelve months. I had barely been living for the last year, but I didn't even know it until I felt the magic of actually feeling alive. I used to get really angry and really upset when people told me I was strong or inspirational or a fighter. I felt like anyone in my situation would have done the same thing. I feel like we all have inside of us that craving to survive and be alive and this awful situation brought that out in me. The other day I heard the quote on a commercial, " I don't need easy, I just need possible." Though it could be just a corny phrase, it really spoke to me. I finally realized what everyone meant that I was strong and an inspiration and yes, that I am a fighter. I realized that for many people when things aren't easy and when things get tough, they crumble. I won't deny that I didn't crumble too, but I fought through it. I knew that getting better was somehow possible even if it was the slightest possibility, it made me fight. I was so hungry for that possibility that I could have my life back. I was so hungry to fight even though things were far from easy. I was so hungry to feel alive. One day, I know I will feel alive all the time, but that will take some time. In the meantime, when the walls of life seem to be crumbling down all around me, I will fight, I will promise you, I will fight.

Chasing pavements

I know a secret...an evil secret. Most of you won't like it, but I have kept it inside long enough. The world is a scary place. People hide behind phrases like "Don't worry, It will be ok," "it's all part of God's plan" and the worst quote, "Everything happens for a reason", instead of accepting the reality that we live in a cruel world. Awful things don't happen for any reason in particular, they just happen, and it sucks. When we are younger, we are told a lot of things, but we aren't told about how sad life can be. We believe that people are invincible, the world is infallible, and as Louie Armstrong would have us believe, the world is in fact, wonderful. As we grow up, we learn that bad things happen to bad people, but that seems justified to us. As we grow older, and as tragedy hits closer and closer to home, we have the harsh realization, that bad things happen to good people, and everything we thought true in the world is irrevocably turned upside down. Love, happiness, friends, and family are the things that make life worth living. But to enjoy those privileges, we signed an unspoken agreement with God and the Devil that awful things might randomly happen to us or our loved ones. I hate how unfair that is. You know, before my stroke, "hate" wasn't even part of my vocabulary, but now it screams from every inch of my body. I hate that all the clothes I was so excited to have 2 years ago will be out of fashion by the time I get better. I hate that I see my favorite pair of high heels every day on our shoe rack, and I realize I may never wear them again. I hate that I haven't been to my bedroom in over 2 years, because I can't walk upstairs, let alone walk. I hate that my parents have to waste so much time and money on therapy that only gets me a tiny tiny tiny bit better. I hate that I only get to see my friends two or three times a year if I am lucky. I hate that I recently had to tell my Duke Medical School friends, after a fit of tears, that I couldn't come watch them graduate( I was supposed to graduate with them in May), because I wouldn't be able to handle being there. I hate that I have had to put all my hopes and dreams aside as well as all my dancing and partying(but that's ok, the club can't even handle me right now). I hate that I don't even remember what genuine happiness feels like. I hate my life. There, I said it. I think saying it is the first step to accepting it, and maybe, eventually changing it. As J.K. Rowling said in her Harvard Commencement speech, it was rock bottom that formed the most stable platform on which she rebuilt her life. It's so easy to say "She is strong, so it will be ok, she is fighting through it", but I get so frustrated everyday because my reality is so hard and the world had forced me to hit rock bottom. Every month when everything seems hard and hopeless, I tell myself "Maybe next month will be better" and so I keep fighting. Sometimes I feel like a dog chasing its tail. It keeps running because it thinks it is getting closer to its goal. But it just ends up being a silly animal running around in circles, never reaching the end. Should I give up, or should I just keep chasing pavements, even if it leads nowhere? I think I will have to continue hiding behind another phrase, "Maybe next month will be better", and so I keep fighting.

No one man should have all that power

But, unfortunately, they do... I'm not talking about Adolf Hitler or Osama bin laden, i'm talking about something different. Something that can control your every action, something that balances you between sheer genius and sheer insanity, something that can make a perfect life not worth living in a matter of seconds. I'm talking about the brain, and yes, it does have that much power. As a medical student, I'm supposed to be intrigued by its intricacies, appreciate its complexities, and encouraged by its capabilities, but instead, I'm just terrified by its power. Though it is hard to believe, I didn't know what exactly had happened to me for the first six months. I knew that I had a dissection that led to a stroke, but that's it. After I left the hospital, I finally met a doctor who was a stroke specialist and he answered some of my questions. Brace yourselves folks, it's about to get kinda nerdy up in here... So, I found out I had a completely random dissection in an artery in my brain that led to turbulent blood flow and a subsequent stroke in the pons. He explained that for the first 6 months, new neurons from the rest of my brain would go to take the place of the neurons in the pons that were killed by the stroke. For the rest of my life, I would have to train those neurons. Can you believe one tiny, little mistake could lead to such widespread damage that would take years to fix? No one man should have all that power.. Now, what people don't tell you, and what you don't learn in medical school, is that strokes really really really suck. The pons is an area of the brain stem and it is responsible for receiving signals from the rest of my brain and translates them into messages they send to the muscles via the spinal cord. These new neurons are up for the challenge, but they have A LOT to learn, to say the least! These new neurons are like, "dayum mami! Why is the rest of the brain bugging us to talk to the muscles?! Wait, what on earth is a muscle? And how the hell are we supposed to talk to them?" These neurons are blank slates and kind of clueless about muscles and messages. They not only need to learn how to turn muscles on, but also how to turn them off. On the other side of that, I also need to strengthen muscles that haven't been used in months. Now there are two huge problems with all of this. First, yes, for example, my arms are getting stronger, but it is nothing without my wrist and my fingers, but those muscles are much smaller, so they are much harder to strengthen. Secondly, when we are normal, there are so many things our body does that we take for granted and don't even notice. Who knew there are about a billion steps involved with walking? Who knew there are muscles in your leg that need to work to keep shoes on your feet? Who even thinks about how they remove their shirt? I need to think about each and every little movement, every muscle, and it is so frustrating, close to impossible. I have been working insanely hard every day for the past 2 years to try to help my brain get my body back to normal. And I tried everything, I mean EVERYTHING. I hope there is a learning curve to all of this, that one day, my brain will take all it has learned and take off running. I'm just a girl, standing in front of my brain asking it to amaze me ;)Instead of being scared of my brain's power, I might as well embrace it. I mean it is my brain that allows me to think of my crazy questions, come up with my insightful theories, and feel every emotion under the sun, and pour it all out into this lovely blog. Most importantly, the best part of the brain's power is what is going to save my life. It is the amazing ability of the brain to recover from an injury, to return the brain back to normal after an accident, and somehow persevere through any bad stroke of luck. This unbelievable ability is called plasticity. And all my hopes and dreams are riding on it, so let's hope the brain does some magic! The brain with all its power is vulnerable even to the smallest of mistakes, but it's capable of so much. I don't expect my brain to do this all alone. It will have my hungry heart, my fearless spirit, and my passionate soul to help it achieve greatness. So let's toast to the brain, my arch enemy and my best friend, and here is hoping its power will impress us all!

Dancing with myself

Song

Boredom used to be a luxury I enjoyed occasionally during rare holidays at home when I didn't have 500 things to do. It felt really good to do nothing. But the day I entered the ICU, boredom became a state of being. Now, doing nothing, literally, felt absolutely awful. All day, everyday, I was alone, except for brief visits from my family. There was silence, absolute silence, except for the incessant beeping from the machines keeping me alive. But I could hear something else... something loud... something dying to get out... something dying to be heard.it was the fear building up inside me, screaming with pain. But there was no escape, no exit, no way out. I had to learn pretty quickly those fears, thoughts, questions that were haunting my every second, were locked forever inside me. I was hopelessly trapped inside myself. Instead of letting my mind self destruct, I embraced it. What I mean is that, I somehow embraced being locked inside myself. I became best friends with myself. I went dancing with my thoughts, singing with my fears, and trying to answer my own questions. I relived all of my memories, freezing them forever in my brain. Since my stroke took away everything else from me, all I had left were my memories, and I was so scared they would slip away too. With time, I was able to use a communication board with my eyes, but I could only spell out a few words. Slowly, I was able to have some semblance of a voice, but it was unintelligible to most. But one day, I got an ultimate cure to my boredom. After seven months of relative silence, I had a voice. I finally had a voice, well, kind of. With some insane technology, I was able to use a computer with a slight movement of my head. I could use email, Facebook, browse the web, play my itunes, everything, all by myself. It may not sound like a big deal, but it truly changed my life. It opened up a world of opportunity, and it opened up, me. One day, I was talking to a friend on gchat, who I hadn't talked to since my stroke, and we were having a fun conversation. I was using some of the phrases I always used, like "Otay" and "Totes" and my friend was like, "Wow, it's really you." Those four simple words really touched me. I had been dying for people to know it was still me inside my mess of a body. Now, I finally had a way to show it, and show it damn well. Then Nisha had the amazing idea to start a blog. I had spent 23 years being a math and science person, but from her brilliant idea, I blossomed into a writer. I was a mathlete and science olympian, and on my way to being a doctor, but my horrible experience, my months of introspection and my hunger to be heard, turned me into a writer. And boy, do I have a lot to say. There is something special about the written word. I haven't figured it out yet, but it allows you to be so brutally honest, much more than you would be in person. I don't know if I am writing for you or writing for me. It feels really good finally get all my thoughts, fears, and questions out there, and hopefully you all are gaining something from my experience. I remember telling my friend that all of these awful things that have happened to me and everything I've learned would all be for nothing if I didn't share it with people. So until my speech becomes normal again, I have this to show you all that it is still me, to tell you all of my secrets, and to forever open up, me.

I will stay with you

(title for chaya and rajul ) when i was younger, i used to have this kind of morbid/kind of twisted dream about my funeral. i never thought about the actual dying part, but about who would come to my funeral. i was kind of cursed and blessed to actually witness my "funeral". but this time,i really wanted to know what people really thought, i wondered what they were thinking when they saw me. i think that everyone who visited me got the same memo; to just walk in my room, smile, and tell me i looked beautiful. but that was perfect because at that time i needed everyone around me to be strong. but after a while, i started to get confused. i was still so shocked, exasperated, horrified, frustrated and in utter disbelief as to what happened to me. but everyone else seemed fine with what happened it was as if they had already accepted what had happened, and since i was getting better, they were all fine with it. but i thought there was nothing fine about it! then one day friend from high school came to visit me. i dont think he had gotten the memo so he was just real with me. he said, "man this really sucks. i can't believe this happened to you". wow i was so thrilled to hear those few words. it was so validating to know someone else was still shocked and upset like me. so over the next few months, through emails, chats, and essays people wrote about this, i had glimpses into how people really felt about this. sometimes it nice and refreshing for someone to be real . while it is also sometimes nice to ignore the enormous elephant in the room and keep conversations light so i can feel happy and normal for a minute, it is also really validating to hear how people really feel. this awful thing has caused me to feel every kind of emotion, so it
feels good to know it makes other people feel something. it makes me feel less alone. the other day, i got an email from my med school friend who did just that, he said...
"Each time i see you, each time i think about you, i have the same overwhelming feeling that everyone around you, all your friends and family, probably have too - this intense wish that i could do something to make it all better right now, instantly. I wish i could gather up a hundred or thousand people and each of us could divide up the muscles that still haven't awoken, and carry them with us until they do. I'd take that left hand and give you mine. I'm sure my Mom would take some erector spinae muscles. And we could just leave you perfect, back to baseline, and all hundred or thousand of us could carry those sleepy muscles so you wouldn't have to."
it was amazing, powerful, and best of all, real. he was frustrated with this too and really wished he could help. i know i have to fight this battle ultimately by myself, but with you all staying with me, im sure as hell, not alone.

Here I go again on my own

april 30, 2009. i had been dreading this day for months. i couldnt believe this inevitable day was approaching rapidly. i was hoping time would just slow down just a little. but april 30 regretably came, and i had to leave the hospital and go home...most people would be so thrilled to go home especially after 5 whole months in the freaking hospital, but i wasnt most people...the hospital was like a buffer, a refuge from the real world. you were supposed to be sick in a hospital. i knew and feared the fact that i would be going from a sick girl at the hospital to a disabled girl at home. (the former implies a more temporary state, the latter sounds worse). the reality of how different my life was going to be came crashing down like a wave that engulfed me and left me drowning in fears. the renovations to our house, the hired helpers, all the new equipment we needed... going home was making me feel the full, horrible longterm effects of a stroke. and the nightmare i had in the ICU began teasing me with its inevitability: becoming a burden at home...but i went home, and i didnt become a burden. i did hate being a stroke victim in the real world, but i also discovered the perks of being home. but i also discovered the worst part of moving home. i became alone. in the hospital, there were at least 60 other patients who could somewhat understand what i was going through, and nurses and doctors had to be there around the clock. in this new world everyone got to leave my reality, except me. in the hospital, i seemed to be in more serious danger, so i got cards, flowers and visitors everyday. but my 'honeymoon' period was over. my family went back to work, my friends went back to school, and i was left behind...i know people want to be there, but everyone has to move on and get back to their own lives. everyone gets to leave this. people get to literally and figuratively leave this. you can even stop reading this if it gets too heavy. but I can't stop living this . my every second , my every minute , my every hour , my every day, this is my reality. the only constant in my life, is me. only now, stronger and braver than before. and as biggie said, "I'm living life without fear" this is my battle, and i'm fighting it fearlessly.