Inspirational Stories

What are you having today, lemons or lemonade? Stroke survivors have clearly been burdened with bushels of lemons. When Neale Mahon received his shipment of lemons, he immediately began concocting the best batch of lemonade he could manage.Neale was born with a brain stem tumor that was discovered when he was 3 years old. Three and a half years of chemo and radiation shrank the tumor and enabled Neale to proceed in life with all the verve and gusto of ...

While it can easily be argued that the metaphor “hit like a ton of bricks” may be a little old and over worked, it is nevertheless, an apt description of the way strokes can suddenly and powerfully devastate a life. And, if it is accurate to say that most stroke survivors felt like they were hit by a ton of bricks when the stroke came crashing down on them, then Tonia Medrick must have felt as if she had been ...

Strokes are not known for their subtleties. Nevertheless, on November 26, 2017 J. Neal Isaac got a subtle hint that his life was about to change in a devastating and dramatic way. He was on a routine drive when he noticed that his right foot did not have the same sensitivity as his left. He thought that perhaps the seat had moved. Later, he experienced another subtle hint when he had a bit of trouble stepping into the shower. Neal wrote ...

A red herring is a literary device that is sometimes used to draw an audience’s attention from the real plot by creating a distracting clue or event. Red herrings are fun and interesting when used in theater. A red herring applied to critical health issues is a much more dangerous situation. At 38 years old Brooke Allen was a vibrant and successful business woman. Her 18 years of service and dedication at Macy’s Department Store saw her work her way ...

Nine years ago Missi Hedrick went to bed and fell asleep in one world and awoke the next day in an entirely different world. Before February 15, 2011 the world Missi knew was pretty normal for a 41 year old single mom with 3 kids. There was her work at the medical research firm where she was a documentation specialist. Her days were filled with writing protocols, research logs and essays, with an occasional business trip to L.A. Then there ...