Edmund is recovering from Bell Palsy

Edmund thought he was having a stroke. He noticed his right eye was drooping and his mouth was leaning towards to the right. I was not home when that happened. Oyen brought him to the emergency room.

The doctors did the stroke protocol to rule out the possibility of stroke. His blood pressure was 178/100, a little high but not high enough to cause a stroke. They also did an MRI of his brain for any blood clot or any changes that indicated major alarm.
Luckily and thanks God, he was not having a stroke.

It was bell palsy. My doctor brother, Kuya Junior, said bell’s palsy is more frightening than nothing. His patients all recovered from it in a month or so. He said Edmund has to be calm and patient.

Edmund got worried when a doctor from Cardinal Santos told him that 20% of his patients didn’t recover, meaning their faces remained distorted. Who’s not going to be scared if that happens. Mababawasan ang kagwapuhan at kagandahan.

We didn’t know that bell’s palsy is fairly common until Edmund got it. My best friend Madeline had it a few years ago. She had a major operation a few months prior. Then one day she had a tremendous headache. When she went to the toilet, she was terrified to see that half of her face was drooping. She never took any medicine. No steroids. She just painstakingly managed it by religiously massaging her face, her eyebrow, her lips. And most importantly she stayed home for a month and relaxed. The only times she went out was to see her doctor.

My neighbor who owns a nursery school told me they had a 7 year old boy who complained of having a headache while riding the school bus. In a few minutes, they were all alarmed when his face became distorted.

Even a 5 year old girl had also caught the virus. She underwent a few weeks of therapy at the hospital. Even a friend of Edmund also had it but according to him, he didn’t stop playing golf to fight it.

This coming Sunday would be the 4th week anniversary of Edmund’s bell palsy. The contortion is now hardly visible unlike in the first two weeks na para syang si Jaws kasi his mouth and teeth were all on his right cheek. Kaya nga when he dared make a quick personal appearance at the office, his loyal employees thought nakulam sya.
He’s still having trouble with his right eye. He has to put eye drops several times a day. He has to wear an eye patch when he sleeps. But all told he has 70% recovered. Last night he was eager to show me he could now whistle.

Could it be the steroids, manghihilot, albularyo, Chinese herbal concoction of mixed scorpion and centipede? Or the acupuncture, massages, tents, that did the trick? Or the prayers, good wishes, a little TLC from all of us?
Although there’s no proof that chewing gums do help people with bell’s palsy in forcing their facial muscles to move, Edmund thinks the gums also helped him in a way during the latter part of his recovery.

A la Duterte

My husband is a tough cookie. He thinks he could take anything. But seeing him go through the ordeal of dealing and managing his health challenge, I knew that it was a tough situation to be in. He was always feeling dizzy. He could not play golf, nor go out. For the first two weeks after the onset, he had no choice but to stay home, going out only to visit doctors. He was irritable and edgy. Of course, if it happened to me baka na freak out na ako. Baka wala akong ginawa kundi umiyak at sumigaw.
On the third week, he resumed his morning walks and light exercises.
This also helped him manage his stresses. Stresses talaga, not only stress, sa dami kasi.

He had cough and colds on the third week of May. Nag byahe pa sya, plus sobrang stress, hayun, humina ang resistensya. When his immune system was down, na tyempuhan sya nung virus.

There is no available literature or medical warnings on how to avoid this kind of virus. But there’s one common situation at least among those people I’ve spoke with. They were stressed and had weak immune system when the virus struck them.

Edmund told me, ang problem hindi talaga natin maiiwasan. KASAMA SA BUHAY YAN. That’s what he’s been telling me lately. Problems come with no warning. Many of the problems that people have are not of their own doing. Our problems vary depending on our abilities to handle them. Many times we think our problems are insurmountable. Para bang kasing taas ng Mayon Volcano. I admit there are times that I feel like our faith in God, our inner strength and the purity of our intentions are not enough. But let’s hang on. Hold on. Let’s not lose our faith that our creator is bigger than our problems.
Basta kapit lang.