A flood? Gee, I don't think I went through a flood...
About 4 years ago, my house in Limestone got hit by a 3/4 ton pickup. In fact, the pickup ended up in the livingroom, and shoved the house about 5 inches on the foundation. The house was a total loss. The insurance company paid me what it was worth, and ended up tearing it down, after the upstairs bedroom caved into the livingroom.
After the house got hit, I moved in with my brother for the winter, then to an apartment in Limestone, and my youngest son lived with me off and on. Then a year and a half ago, I decided to move to Presque Isle, because I worked there and was tired of making the 56 mile round trip every day. Again, my son moved with me, but ended up moving to Boston for 4 months, then back with me. Right after Dan moved back last summer, one morning he found me unconscious in the basement. I'd had a ruptured aneurysm in my brain, something most people don't live through. They flew me to Boston, where I lay unconscious for a month, then to Bangor to see if they could get me to come to. One day, I just woke up and said, "Where the hell am I and how did I get here?" I had a lot of brain damage... my right hand was curled up and wouldn't move much, and I couldn't walk at first. For some reason, within a week I was walking pretty well, could talk and was in pretty good shape. I stayed in Bangor for 22 days, then came back home and started going to therapy, mostly to get my right side back up to strength. I'm still going to therapy, mostly just to try and improve my short term memory, which was pretty much wiped out by the stroke.
Because of the stroke, I was told I couldn't live alone, and when Dan moved into the house with his fiance, I went with him, but that just didn't work out. You know how it is when there are two women in one house. One of them is always in the wrong (me), so I talked to my doctors and they decided I was better off on my own, where there was less stress. I got an apartment in my home town. I'm not able to work (stress and memory problems) but I have a private disability policy and that's more than enough to pay my bills.
It's funny. When I couldn't move my right hand much, my biggest concern was that I'd never be able to play the guitar or fiddle again, and that was worse than death to me. I remember hoping I'd just kick the bucket in my sleep. But it eventually all came back. It's been a lot of work, but I'm pretty normal, or at least as normal as I was before the aneurysm.
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