I suffered a right cerebellar stroke on March 2019 at the age of 34. Yep, you read that correctly. About 3 or 4 days before I bought through Jetblue my 4 day trip in May to be at my goddaughters graduation. I bought the non-refundable type because, what could go wrong??? To jump around, the doctors say that I’m able to take a plane, so I’m going to her graduation.

The day that it happened I basically got very dizzy and kept getting dizzier. I even searched in the computer about strokes because I also felt my left arm getting weaker. I said to myself that I was too young, but then I got dizzier and dizzier, so I called 911. When I went to work my writing was off, but I didn’t think much of it. I threw up in the emergency room, where they cut through all my clothes. Then I passed out. I woke up in the ICU room with several tubes in my mouth that at times I would start by throwing up again, though it was mostly saliva. Once they took that off on the third day, I stopped throwing up. I tried to tell them, but with the tubes in my mouth I couldn’t speak and they didn’t understand my sign language attempt.

It turns out I have a vein get dislodged and a clot formed, giving me the right cerebellar stroke. I had one MRI and like 5 CATScans. For the MRI they had to move me from my bed to the MRI bed because I was too weak to get out of the bed. The first few CATScan they moved me, then I moved myself. I was very dizzy, I must say.

It has been two months since the attack and I have right side of face paralyzed except the right eye, although I can’t fully close the eye. As a consequence, I have to pour fake tears on my right eye and sleep with an eye patch. I can now feel better any touch to the right face, but its not like in the left which is normal. I can also feel some of the muscles while before I couldn’t feel a muscle in my right face at all or even move it. Sometimes I drool from right mouth.

My right arm/hand and leg/foot are weaker than my left side. I always had sensation, but it was less than on the left. The right arm/hand was slow and has got a lot faster than before. My hand still shakes when I write and my writing looks like a first grader, but the shakes have got a lot shorter and easier to stop. My writing is also getting better. I also use the Saebo Glove to stabilize my right hand and allow me to write without holding the right hand with the left. Before I always had to hold my hand with my left to attempt stopping the shaking. Apparently, in a few months the shaking is suppose to stop.

I use a walker because I couldn’t keep my balance. It has got a lot better with therapy. I’m currently at the first week trying the cane, which is a lot better than the walker. I do the balance therapy exercises and some balance exercise offered at the Saebo website too.

My right hearing is off, only a high pitch sound. Now, when I was fine I still suffered from Tinnitus in both ears, so I don’t know if its a new high pitch or the old one. Sone doctors say the hearing will come back while other doctors says its gone forever. I say lets wait and see, since that is all I can do at the moment. I have got used to hearing everything through the left ear.

My right eyesight is slightly off, although I saw double visions plus everything moving for 3 or 4 days after the stroke. Only the left end was everything stable, so I look mostly that way. I feel every day its a little less to wake up and feel the body move to the right. I still feel dizzy, especially when I’m standing and walking. It had got better, but I can still feel it. From about my right forehead to my right ear, passing by my right eye and even my right nostril, I feel a pressure that its daily going away, but only a little.

I go to outpatient therapy and its suppose to end in a month. Before that I spent like 5 days in ICU, 4 days in another big room where they have the normal people, and then 2 weeks in hospital therapy. I also do most of the exercises at home everyday.

In the middle of this week I visited another doctor who showed me for the first time my MRI shots and where in my brain the stroke happened. He also said that I was very lucky, but where he made the difference versus all the other doctors that said that was by telling me that if the clot would had happen 1 to 2 millimeters above the artery my only solution would had been death.

That’s my experience with the cerebellar stroke. I really hope to walk again, write again without the glove, and feel normal enough to go to work by the end of this month. I don’t think its going to happen, but you never know. I’m going on the flight at the end of May to the graduation of my goddaughter, God willing.