"Matters of the Heart"

My friend Dave and I spent today at a really interesting event at The Wellness Institute which is located at the Seven Oaks Hospital in Winnipeg.

This is Heart and Stroke Month, and the Wellness Institute hosted a 5 hour event focused on heart healthy living.

We arrived with a lot of time for the nine am opening. The event had about 90 people attending and there was a little registration package with some information and my pack had a red heart and Stroke association Frisbee.

We started with a welcome followed by a stretch break. It was really a little crowded for that kind of stretching but everyone seemed to appreciate the exercise break.

We listened to the keynote speaker, Dr Lerner discuss the role of Atrial Fibrillation in heart disease. He shared the statistic that people with this form of heart rhythm are at a hugely increased risk of stroke and acknowledged that many doctors are not being aggressive enough in their care of such patients. His language was a little technical for the audience but he was interesting and he did show a fair bit of humor through his presentation. He was incredibly willing to answer questions and to clarify points.

There was a break with a healthy snack, blood pressure testing stations and educations information pamphlets followed by another session of mild exercising and a draw for door prizes.

We also attended a healthy baking session where Dave and I learned a lot of information about improving our baking. More important, we learned a lot about how cooking information can be shared in a public forum like that. I think we have a lot to share at upcoming Healthy Cooking sessions at The Stroke Recovery Association. The dietitian, Carolyn Somerville, gave a handout of information and recipes that will be incredibly useful for me. I am going to try out most of them and I will share some of the results on this blog.

The last session we did was about relaxation and reducing stress and improving blood pressure. She discussed the role of humor, deep breathing and she gave a brief introduction to a body scan approach to relaxation. As part of the humor section she had us listen to the following You Tube clip about Tim Horton's. It really had the whole group relaxed and laughing and receptive to what she had to share. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LvoB5rP-flY

Dave and I thought it was a great experience and we definitely plan to attend next year's Matter of the Heart event.

Valentine's Tea and Baking Cookies

Yesterday was the annual "Valentines Tea" at my local Stroke Recovery Association. I was so excited about it. I was into making goodies for the bake sale, I donated materials for the silent auction, I took a turn selling tickets for an upcoming ticket draw for some really nice jewelery. I worked hard on convincing my stroke affected friends and their families that they should come. The tea was a great success and we had a lot of fun. The weather was mild, at least for here, and we had a really good turnout.

The thing that mattered the most to me was the fact that the girls from the Girl Guides of Canada groups I am associated came to help serve tea and the sandwiches and dainties. We had 2 young adults and 7 girls between the ages of 12 and 16 volunteered to help and they were absolutely awesome! I was so very proud of them.

It was kind of strange to combine the two charities that I am involved with but the girls felt great about helping and the people attending the tea commented over and over what wonderful hard working girls were serving the tea.

The treats I made were a success too. Baking is one of the things I have struggled with and I really have had to work hard on getting my skills back. Baking involves measuring and using numbers, it involves remembering what you have already added and it requires remembering that you put it in the oven and not letting it burn to a smokey crisp.

I have made "peanut blossom" cookie several times and I am starting to get a routine worked out at least for this kind of cookie.

I saw the link for these cookies with a heart shaped chocolate instead of a Hershey Kiss and I though that was perfect for a Valentine's Day tea. I will confess the first batch was left in the oven long enough that they weren't fit to use, but the second day I got more chocolates, tried again and didn't leave the kitchen for the 10 minutes they need to bake.

The cookie recipe and the picture above is from eighteen25.blogspot.com.
I love their blog-- it makes me feel like cooking and crafting.

Guitar Lessons Started Again

I am about to head off to my 4th Guitar lesson. It is actually going very well. My right hand is fully healed with only a thickened little scar area and still a little bit of stiffness in the top finger joint. My left had is miles ahead of where it was before my "good right" hand got so painful and icky. Basically I was forced to use my weaker left hand and now it functions pretty well, however it is a little stiff getting started and kind of achy.

The sensation in my hand still feels kind of off, but I can tell when I am touching something and I can tell hot from cold. Basically it kind of feels a like bit like a "pins and needles" sensation, especially compared to my other hand, but the weird sensation doesn't interfere with my activities at all.

Guitar lessons started off as a physiotherapy kind of plan to really challenge my hand to work, and it is indeed going to continue to help my coordination and speed improve. What is surprising to me is how hard I am finding it to read the music notes and to read music chords.... and well ....to basically remember what the teacher showed me 2 minutes before.

I should not be surprised that I can't read music fluently anymore. If I could initially forget what numbers were and struggle so hard to get back any sense of numeracy I should not be surprised that a different symbolic kind of communication has been lost as well.

So back to the beginning of reading yet again. The staff lines are e...g...b...d...f...

Cognitive therapy, here we go once again.

sighhhh