It’s Difficult Not to Compare My ‘Before-self’ to My ‘After-self’: Learning to Feel Whole Following a Life-changing Disability

By Shondra Riley

The room was sterile and bright. My husband was at the foot of the bed with my in-laws, who had flown in from England. To my left, my 10-day-old baby was sleeping in a clear box with wheels. I wanted to check on him, maybe hold him in my arms and smell that fantastic newborn smell, but I couldn’t get up. I couldn’t move a muscle. With every try, I felt the distance between my baby and me expanding like the hallway scenes in a psychological thriller.

It was a longing of a magnitude I never knew until that moment. I needed to understand why gravity had me pinned down and why my in-laws were in Manama. I was exasperated, and I hadn’t done or said anything. I desperately looked to my husband for answers. He gave them to me as he wept.

While he explained what happened, my memories flickered like a film trailer. Me, crawling on my belly, a baby crying in the distance. Being rushed down a hospital corridor. My husband pushing the grey and lime green pram alongside me with a distraught look on his face. I could retell the story in detail, but no need. I can tell it to you in four words: I had a stroke.

I was thirty-eight years old and had just become a first-time mum. Ten days after giving birth, a blood clot blocked blood and oxygen flow to my brain. In the blink of an eye, my life was split into two parts: Before and After. I interpreted the intent of the stroke as swift justice. I questioned my life before and held up every transgression, perceived or otherwise, as the reason for my ‘punishment’. I also split myself into two parts: Her and Me.

I will never measure up to Her beauty or intelligence, wild abandon and magnetic personality. She was a fiercely independent and clever woman. She was fit and liked to keep Her appearance exemplary. She usually drank too much and wasn’t very self-aware, but she had a good heart, and she was a good mother. What happened to Her was cruel. But did she deserve it?

I decided she did. She didn’t deserve the husband, the money or the gorgeous baby, and that’s why it was all taken away. Me, I would pay the price for it in ways I could have never imagined.

My past self was like a relative that died before I was born. She was physically robust and more beautiful. She was self-assured but on the cusp of arrogance. Even though we shared the same brain, she was more competent and capable. She was gone now, and I was left to carry on. Even though I was broken, physically and emotionally, I could fight. Did my struggle make me a better person?

I was hyper-aware that my life had changed forever. When a harsh marker drops into your timeline, there’s no warning or preparation for the struggles ahead, only profound grief. It can take a while to sink in. When it does, it varies in degrees but never leaves.

For a year, I threw myself into getting better. If recovery was the road, Physiotherapy and Occupational Therapy were the lorries, and I had my foot heavily on the gas pedal. I would learn to live with my disability and be the best mum that I could be. To prove it, I signposted the journey with inspirational soundbites on Facebook about patience and perseverance.

I felt I surpassed Her as a mother because I was weathered and wise. I was determined to take this bumpy and detoured path with grace and dignity. I proved to everyone I was as good as Her, if not better. I hadn’t convinced myself, though. I continued to compare myself to the competent, healthy woman I used to be.

Over the next few years, we moved back to the UK. I managed a household independently while my husband went away each week to work. I completed four 5K Fun Runs. Became the Parent Council Chairperson at my son’s school, volunteered in the school library, and held tea parties for the elderly. I also ran a community interest company that received a motion in the Scottish Parliament in 2020 for its support of local creatives during COVID-19. Still, I unfavourably compared myself to the woman I used to be. I was never going to be as good as Her. How could I when I was like ‘this’?

After eleven years of therapy, I began to look at people in my life who live with disabilities. I’d remind myself not to speak to myself in a way that I wouldn’t to them. I began following people who helped me improve my inner dialogue. Disability Activists like Nina Tame, Anna Smith Higgs, Imani Barbarin and Keah Brown taught me to be proud of who I am.

I also connected with Corlis Renee’s blog, ‘What’s Better Than Life After Fifty’. I drew on childhood Heroines like Maya Angelou, Helen Keller and Kathy Miller, all of whose grace and tenacity have given me pause for thought throughout my life. I was comforted that I was not alone and could have a whole life despite, and maybe even because of, the adversity I was facing.

Slowly, I realised that all those things about me before I became disabled are still a part of who I am. I wouldn’t have survived the trauma without them. Dividing my timeline may have allowed me to cope with the changes in my circumstances. Still, I needed to focus on being a fully integrated human because living as two parts was no longer serving me. She and I are one and the same.

I began to understand that I was compartmentalising as a way of punishing myself. I was denied my full power because I had a stroke, so I didn’t feel I deserved access to it. I couldn’t possibly still be that dynamic woman.

It’s difficult not to compare my ‘before-self’ to my ‘after-self’. My focus is to honour my whole self with compassion and appreciation. I lost some abilities, and my marriage ended eventually. What happened to me was cruel, but I know I didn’t deserve it. I am still independent, beautiful, and a great mother. I’m also a creative, resilient badass who has lived a challenging, complex, and rewarding life – before and after.