Hi, I’ve never joined anything like this, it’s all very new to me but I’m feeling a little lost.
My partner had a stroke just before Christmas, he’s home, he came home 30th December. Physically he’s doing really well, he’s come a long way, however Mentally and emotionally he’s struggling. He has appointments via the phone with a neuro psychologist and also a neuro occupational therapist, is this enough? Should I be fighting for more support for him? Our GP is amazing and has helped medically a lot, however I feel I’ve been forgotten and just left to cope?
I am an only child, and I was caring for my wonderful mum who was my best friend, this time last year, she had terminal cancer and passed away in March. Her and my partner was my only support, I can’t keep relying on my daughter who’s only 18 and is so young and has her life to live.
I don’t really know what I’m asking for, I think maybe I just needed to express myself. I’m doing my best to be a mum to my two children, a good “wife”/partner and also a carer.
I wonder if he would benefit from talking with other stroke victims ? This is most likely to be online just now, but hopefully actual meet up in the future.
Hi Butterbee, welcome to the forum. Your situation sounds similar to mine. My husband had a stroke in July and now has aphasia as a result. Are the appointments with the neuro psychologist and the neuro occupational therapist helping? My husband was referred for speech and language therapy, also occupational therapy. Unfortunately he turned down the speech therapy after about 3 sessions and the OT only came once.
Stroke spouses do tend to be forgotten about. If you have a stroke specialist nurse you could ask about counselling. The stroke specialist nurse in my area offered the service to me, which I accepted and had 6 weeks of counselling by phone. It was good to talk about my needs as opposed to my husband’s needs. Is there a stroke association in your area? The Chest, Heart and Stroke Association ran a course on Zoom for carers here on looking after someone post stroke and are available to answer any queries. There’s not much more they can do in the current situation.
I recommend you register with Care for a Cuppa, which is a Zoom session on Monday afternoons, run by Carers UK. Here is a link:
I’ve only made it to one session for various reasons, but it was good to talk to other people having similar situations and experiences to mine. Hopefully I’ll make it to the next session on Monday.
Welcome to our forum, I’m so glad you’ve found us!
Along with all the support you will get via the forum, we also run weekly online meet ups on zoom for carers to get together and chat informally. We run them every Monday afternoon at 3pm for an hour or so. People say they’ve found it really helpful and supportive and it’s nice to be able to take a little bit of time for yourself and meet other carers. There’s no pressure to share any more than you’re comfortable with. Join up details are here: https://www.carersuk.org/help-and-advice/get-support/online-meetups
We would love to see you there
kind regards
Ingrid