Jimmy had a devastating stroke on the 20/02/2020.

He was a patient in CUH and St Finbarr’s Hospital for 7 months,  family visits  for first 2 weeks and the remainder six and half months without  a visitor due to Covid 19.

He was discharged Sept 2020 a day that would change all our lives for ever.

Jimmy scared and frightened, the stroke had wiped left side of his brain, lost the use of his right arm and right leg, he was unable to speak. We his family had no idea what lay ahead.

HSE provided home help two hours a day, Jimmy needed assistance of one 24/7. We were catapulted into another world overnight.

 The Jimmy that did everything for his family, guests and customers now needed our help.

The day that should have been a joyous one was a dark day, we didn’t know how this was going to pan out. 

Our mantra was” Keep Going.”

We settled into a routine, family, care assistants, neighbours, relatives and friends were a great support.

We kept going but we were not getting very far.

Several months later we located a brochure in Jimmy’s discharge documents for Cork Stroke support.

The phone call was made and we were invited to join.

We loaded up the car and headed off to Mahon and then continued to Bessboro, along the way we said “well this journey we won’t do again.”

We arrived at the door, the welcome we got we will not forget. "Come in, have a cup of tea” and from there the rest is history. We are going every week since.

We met other people that were catapulted into the same Stroke recovery world as ourselves.

One thing the stroke did not take from Jimmy was his singing voice and he joined the choir “Stroke Notes”. This year 2023 his choir will be singing in part of Cork Coral Festival. The stroke Support centre is there for Jimmy and all us his family five days a week.  Our “What’s app” group never stops we have found our tribe.

When Jimmy came home from hospital it was a dark day for all the family, we did not know how to progress. Cork Stroke Support shone a light and the recovery started for all the family.

We now know how the significances of the first step for a stroke survivor’s recovery.

We as a family hope to do more than a million steps in this Steps for Strokes fundraiser .

300,000 steps each in the month of Feb. 2023.  

Thanks for taking the time to read our story. I hope you can help by donating. Click Donate “Mc McCarthy’s step together”   Click donate button.

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Many thanks

Mc McCarthy’s step together