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Bringing Back Traci
Over the next 24 hours, he rejoiced at each new milestone. Although her speech was soft and slurred, she whispered simple words, such as "yes," "no" and "hi." She also recognized friends and relatives who dropped by, and even greeted her brother-in-law by his nickname, "Dupe." On Sunday afternoon, a day and a half after the stroke, she took her first steps, with the aid of a walker. "I was very excited, relieved and hopeful," says Michael. Even though Traci seemed dazed, and had limited use of her right arm, he was convinced that over time, she'd recover 100 percent.
The next day, however, there was a setback. When a doctor checked her vision, she didn't react when he shone a flashlight into her left eye. "I was devastated that I couldn't see on that side," says Traci, who was struggling to understand what had happened to her. "I didn't get the whole stroke thing, or why something was wrong with my left eye, when the other problems were on the right side of my body." The doctor thought that a fragment of the clot might have blocked flow to a vessel in that eye during the stroke, but he held out hope that her vision might eventually return. By the end of the week, she could see shadows.
She graduated from a walker to a cane, and began to speak in complete sentences. "I'm going to be okay," she told her parents. They were helping Michael care for the kids. Rylee was too young to talk, but Alexis kept asking to see her mom. She had to wait until Traci was moved from the ICU to a regular hospital room. Before the visit, Michael explained that Traci used Play-Doh to exercise her hand. Alexis rifled through her toy box until she found a container of pink Play-Doh, the little girl's favorite color. "This will help Mommy get better," she proclaimed. Traci was so happy to see the children that she burst into tears, then put Alexis in her lap while they squeezed and molded the Play-Doh together.
After a week, Traci was transferred to a rehabilitation center, where she received physical, occupational and speech therapies. Two weeks after the stroke, she was well enough to go home and begin outpatient treatment. Before long, she was walking without a cane, though her right foot dragged, causing her to stumble frequently. She gradually learned to walk normally, and her right arm gained greater strength and flexibility, though it remains weaker than the left. Learning to write again was a struggle. At first, she could barely print her name, but eventually, her penmanship was nearly perfect.
As her physical skills returned, her thinking also got sharper. "About four weeks after the stroke, it finally hit me how serious this was. I wanted to know, Why me?" Tests revealed a previously undiagnosed birth defect: a small hole in her heart that made her more prone to stroke. However, doctors decided to postpone repair until she was further along with her recovery. Meanwhile, sight gradually returned to her left eye, though her vision is blurry on that side. She fumbles for a word occasionally but has no other speech problems.
In early July, she returned to her job at a pharmaceutical company. "I'm amazed that I had a 50-50 chance of dying, but I'm still here," says Traci, who had a cardiac repair operation in September. She's also had an emotional change of heart. "I've cut back on my hours at work, and I take more vacations. My life is here at home with my girls and my husband, and I want to enjoy it to the fullest."
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