David Wasielewski

Helping others to overcome stroke

At age 48, David Wasielewski worked as a management specialist in information technology. An active man, he had a wife, young son, and a passion for skiing. Then, on a Monday morning in March 2005, he remembers, "I woke up with a really bad headache. I had a little history of migraines, but that day even compazine didn't help."

He went to bed early that evening and in the night his life changed.  "My wife tells me she woke up and I was banging on my head. She realized I wasn't moving properly and dialed 911. After the ambulance took me to the hospital, they couldn't even do a scan because I was having seizures. I didn't really wake up until Thursday." 

Despite his age, Wasielewski had had a stroke, the result of a carotid artery dissection. A clot from a tear in an artery wall clogged a blood vessel in his brain. Though the cause remains unknown, today he lives with the effects. He had to relearn how to walk and talk and, after extensive physical, speech, and occupational therapy, he has regained some motor control on his left side. He drives again, but reports that "it feels like I'm on novacaine on the left side of my body." 

Although persistent fatigue prevents him from returning to his old career, Wasielewski says, "I'm okay, I can function fairly normally." More than that, he has found a way to help others. "I go to school at Berkshire Community College. I'm taking a human services program, and a class on counseling. I do volunteer work at Berkshire Medical Center, and at the Berkshire South Regional Community Center where they're building a program for adaptive fitness. People like me, people who are differently-abled, can work out there on special equipment integrated into the existing fitness room."

He also counsels more recent stroke survivors in BMC's peer visitor program. "When I was in the hospital there wasn't anybody to talk to, no one who'd been through it. When I went to a support group, I found a lot of people had the same concern. So now therapists refer me to patients who are ready to talk to someone."

In looking back over the last several years, Wasielewski says, "I call it my big adventure. I can't say it was a good thing. But I met tons of people I would never have known about. I've seen what good things people around me are capable of. You just don't know what people are able to do-my wife, my friends, they took care of me. And now that I'm pretty self-sufficient, I can be a cheerleader for other people who've had strokes.

"It's my way of putting something back."