Two strokes behind them, advantage love
In geometry, parallel lines never intersect. Parallel lives? That’s another story.
Love is stronger than math, and in romance, parallel lives can not only meet, assisted by unlikely twists of fate (and the intervention of the Hamilton General Hospital); but they can even get tied into knots, such as matrimony.
And so it was and so it is with Jennifer and Jeff Wolfenden, two people whose paths were separated widely by different origins, professions, ethnicities and social circles. At the same time, those paths mirrored each other, eerily, when it came to the core of their beings, namely, their hearts.
When he was 36, in 2003, Jeff was ambushed by a heart attack. Then, on top of that in 2008, while doing renovation work in his home, he suffered a terrifying stroke. When she was 37, in 2006, Jennifer was working out to an aerobic tape at home when she too had a heart attack. In 2010, she too had a stroke.
Both of them recovered from their heart attacks — and their strokes — at the Hamilton General Hospital. Still, though they both lived in the city, they might have continued to never meet, save for the Hamilton Young Stroke Survivors Group that Jeff started in 2010. There wasn’t one here at the time, and he was tired of going to Peel and Halton to attend the ones there.
One day that year a woman walked into the young survivors’ meeting. “It was July or August,” says Jeff, “When she came through the door, I asked her, as I did with everyone, ‘How are you?’ and “How long has it been since your stroke?’”
And then he said — here Jennifer takes over, recalling her first impression — “‘So, what’s your story?’ I’d just met him two seconds before. I thought it was bold, the way he asked.” They look at each other as they tell the story now, in their lovely
apartment overlooking the harbour, and smile reminiscently.
If she was less than instantly swept off her feet, not to fret. There was time — stroke recovery is not the business of an afternoon but a lifetime. And as they came to dwell on the bizarre similarities of their experience and as Jennifer stepped up with the organization of the group, they found their lives were not so much parallel anymore as entwined.
“We became co-chairs,” says Jeff. “She had learned the secret from her old boss when she worked at McMaster University. How does it go? Food is the glue to every great meeting?”
“The lubricant,” Jennifer gently corrects. “Food is the lubricant of any gathering.” Jennifer, born in Guyana (she came here when she was 17), brought food and much more. The group grew.
Jennifer and Jeff would go with each other to their various doctors’ appointments.
At one of those appointments, says Jeff, “my cardiologist looked at us and said, ‘It’s unheard of.’” That kind of coincidence.
By 2013, they were at Jeff’s father’s condominium in Waterdown for a special occasion — their engagement party. Everyone was there. But Jeff and Jennifer were not done with their surprises. They’d brought along a special guest. The minister at their church.
“We got married, right then and there, Dec. 7, at the engagement party,” says Jeff.
They followed that up in the spring with a wedding reception at the Dundas Driving Park.
There are few if any visible signs now that they’re stroke survivors. They’ve made great strides. At first Jeff couldn’t swallow (even now only half his throat opens), he couldn’t bend his one arm and he couldn’t walk — for a long time.
“The first time I was able to walk to the bathroom in rehab and pee on my own, it was like I’d won the Stanley Cup,” he says. “I hadn’t been able to for many weeks.”
For her part, Jennifer had enormous struggles with speech and short-term memory and the strength on her left side.
Few visible signs perhaps, but their lives are changed forever. Neither can work (though they both volunteer enormously) and they must parcel out their limited energy carefully.
“Everything we do, we have to try 100 times harder,” says Jennifer.
If one is standing behind and to the left of Jennifer, she can’t process what’s being said and she has some pattern recognition deficit.
“So if you see Jeff standing behind me on the left, you know we’re fighting,” she says teasingly.
And Jeff doesn’t have the balance to skate — he used to love playing hockey. But he can ride a motorcycle and recently acquired a Harley-Davidson 1500, a huge step for him.
“People say sometimes, ‘How can you be so happy?’” says Jennifer. “We’ve worked hard and need to be grateful and not bitter about what isn’t and what we haven’t got, but happy about what we have got and what we can do.”
Bitterness, anger, depression — these are common responses to what strokes do to people, and Jennifer and Jeff understand that but they also know the importance of trying to move beyond. They profoundly appreciate the General, and they are grateful to their community at Church of the Rock on the Mountain.
This coming weekend they will once again, as the Wolf’s Den team, be patient ambassadors in the annual Strides For The General, presented by Medtronic, Saturday, Sept. 15, at Bayfront Park. The event features 5K walk, 5K and 10K runs, breakfast and lunch, live music, participant medals and prizes. All proceeds will support the Hamilton General Hospital.