Prognosis: Get MORE Healthy

Me typing this blog.

So today my handsome young immigrant physician, talking like he has to be somewhere else in 43 seconds, tells me a small piece of my cerebellum has croaked and that my caroited artery has something of a narrowing (59 percent) that may have caused my dizzy/slurred speech problem.

That means I had a stroke, but it's a tiny stroke, much like the one I had at 22 when I was healthy as a moose.

What I need to do now is drop some weight, drop some salt, drop some white food that I'm not supposed to be eating anyway and pick up the exercise. It also means that I'll be taking a powerful drug for about 28 days to get rid of any buildup in the artery and to either stabilize or reduce the problem. The drug has a side effect of thin blood (thus, bleeding like a wild man when I'm cut and a lot of bruising).

I get released from the towering walls of Carilion in just a bit and my beef stew--which I was cooking when I decided to visit the ER--awaits. Minus the potatoes.

(Photo: Sonya Chappelear.)