Before Healthwise

By Ann

I was leading a very happy and active life, my family was expanding with the arrival of grandchildren and another one was on the way. My job was interesting with lots of responsibility. I had a great social life with many friends, enjoyed holidays and trips away in our touring caravan and I just loved our garden which I'd designed and maintained. Overnight all of this was shattered when I woke up blind as a result of complications during an operation. My body had gone into shock and my brain had suffered the effects of a stroke. You can imagine, my family and I were devastated, I had lost my independence, I felt useless, no good to anyone and became an anxious wreck and that's putting it mildly. Fortunately I had extremely supportive family and friends along with a caring medical team and with their help I began to recognise that although I couldn’t do things the way I had before I just had to learn to do them differently. I just needed someone with me all the time which was hard.

The turning point came when my four year old grandson said to me, “Grandma, you don't go to work now, so you can come with Granddad to pick me up from nursery” and that was my motivation. How could I be miserable when he was just so excited at the thought of me going to nursery? It was a struggle and although I couldn’t see him I can still hear the excitement of him shouting, “Grandma, Grandma”, as he ran towards me.

The next turning point was about a year or so later. Some of my sight had recovered although my visual fields were very limited. I was registered as partially sighted. To try and reduce my stress levels I enrolled on a taster in aromatherapy and a confidence building course and it was there that I met new friends and we eventually became the founder members of Healthwise in the year 2000.

I have never looked back since; the support given while sharing and learning new skills and activities has given me a new confident life which I thoroughly enjoy and I really look forward to my Thursday mornings and doing new things such as learning how to compile this story using an ipad. I just thank everyone in Healthwise and our various funders who have believed in our cause and supported us and helped me turn my life around.