Published: October 05, 2008 11:32 pm            

Stroke victim battles through therapy

For more than half a century, Loretta Phillips spent her time painting landscapes and portraits.

But on April 15, her life changed suddenly.

She was in her Mexico home when she began to “feel funny.”

“I fell to the floor,” the 69-year-old recalled Thursday. “There wasn’t any pain, things were not right.”

Her husband, Richard, came into the house from an attached mechanical shop to find his wife of 35 years lying on the floor.

“It was a big shock,” he said. “She didn’t want to go to the hospital and wanted me to help her up.”

He called 911 and his wife was transported to Dukes Memorial Hospital in Peru and was later transferred to St. Joseph Hospital.

She had suffered a stroke.

She had a 100 percent blockage in an artery and a clot broke free, affecting the left side of her brain.

“Surgery was not an option,” Richard said. “Fortunately, there is a secondary blood supply that bypasses the area and delivers adequate blood to the brain.”

The stroke caused the loss of movement in her right arm and leg, and she currently walks with the aid of a cane.

During an almost four-week stay at St. Joseph Hospital, Loretta Phillips started speech, occupational and physical therapy. Her occupational therapy continues twice a week at St. Joseph Physical and Sport Therapy.

The ultimate goal of the therapy is to have Phillips renewing her love of painting. She now paints with her left hand, and she currently is working on a landscape.

At the age of 12, Phillips began teaching herself to paint.

“I was putting down the things I see and feel,” she said of her paintings. “There was a lot of trial and error.”

In the speech therapy room there is a photograph of a painting Phillips did of a lighthouse.

“It was a scary experience,” she said of the stroke. “It came totally out of the blue. There were no previous problems.”

Occupational therapist Seema Sood said therapy’s focus is to return function to the affected arm and leg and to return Phillips to an independent lifestyle.

“The long-term goal is for her to return to painting,” Sood said. “There are small steps. The therapy is using the hand for day-to-day things and to build up from that.”

In addition to the weekly therapy sessions in Kokomo, Phillips does daily exercises at her home, with assistance from her husband.

“I have absolutely seen a lot of progress,” Sood said. “All I can do is guide her, because we only see them two times a week. The home exercise is important.”

Richard Phillips has been documenting his wife’s progress since April 18 and has noted 170 key events.

“We go back and look at the benchmarks,” he said. “Loretta can see the progress. For the first time, on Wednesday, she walked about 600 feet with her head up and is beginning to multi-task.

“It has been a lot of progress in my opinion,” he noted. “Every time we come there is a new exercise to do. There has been an immense amount of small steps.”

Richard Phillips said the couple has a large family and group of friends, prayers at work all over. Updates are posted on a Web site.

“There has been an outpouring of love from people, from people we don’t even know,” he said. “Lot of encouragement.

“This has been a shock to us,” he continued. “There have been many blessings. We pray 20 times more, there has been good that has come from it.”

Ken de la Bastide can be reached at (765) 454-8580 or via e-mail at ken.delabastide@kokomotribune.com

        

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