Art helps stroke survivors in healing process

Don Clauson struggles to do the things he previously loved since suffering a stroke more than a year ago. The 80-year-old says it has completely changed his life.

“You go to bed on a Saturday night and wake up Sunday morning a different person, it took all my right side,” Clauson said.

Because he participated in occupational rehab and speech therapy, he has made huge progress to get some of that mobility back, but it might never fully return. Immediately after his stroke he could no longer swallow or speak, but these days he is eating what he wants and his speech has mostly recovered.

One area where he’s still working is improving his construction of model planes. He started making them as a child, but took it up again after a 50-year break.

“I got a whole bunch of them hanging upstairs now, about every two or three months I come up with another one,” Clauson said.

His completed Grumman F-14 Tomcat was featured as part of an art display at Logan Health Medical Center in Kalispell. The display during Stroke Awareness Month aimed to draw attention to stroke recovery by featuring artwork from patients who have been through its occupational rehab program.

According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, more than 600,000 people on average in the United States have a stroke for the first time every year. For so many, it means losing the ability to go through life as they did before.

Christina Armstrong, stroke program coordinator at Logan Health, said making art is one way to assist in recovery following a stroke.

“After a stroke, art therapy can be extremely beneficial. It helps survivors strengthen their fine motor skills by giving special attention to techniques and movements that may help stimulate brain function and improve hand-eye coordination,” Armstrong said.

Facing similar challenges to getting back to what he likes to do, 66-year-old Kraig Emby of Kalispell had his models of a Soviet tank, a Japanese “zero” aircraft from World War II and a World War I German siege gun on display at the hospital. He’s been collecting models for his entire life.

“If I keep them, they collect dust and I can't buy anymore because there's no space. So I give them away,” Emby said.

Emby joined the Army when he was 18 and used his G.I. Bill to go to college and study history. When the pandemic began in 2020, he quarantined himself for two years, but his biggest health scare couldn’t be transmitted. It was right around the time of his 66th birthday last year when he had his stroke.

“One day I was walking down the street and had a stroke … I had my phone but I couldn't communicate with my girlfriend … She looked and saw that I was talking nonsensically and said ‘something's wrong.’ People were around me and saved my life,” Emby said.

His journey to recover after his stroke has been difficult. He volunteers at the homeless shelter and enjoys walks around town, watching for birds and walking a similar route he did as an 8-year-old growing up in Kalispell.

“I used to take the bus, but I'm trying to exercise. I want to be a person again,” Emby said.

Health issues are still a struggle for Emby, but he still has a smile on his face. He’s made great strides since his stroke nearly a year ago and he attributes that to having a good attitude.

“The answer is attitude. Attitude, that’s what the doctor said kept me alive,” Emby said.

Clauson agrees that a good attitude can help to persevere through the hardship of recovering from a stroke. To those who are just beginning to embark on that journey, he says “hang on, it gets better.”

“For most people the recovery, it just takes time,” Clauson said. “And your progress slows down as you go along, you get real rapid progress at the beginning, but the longer it goes it’s like a curve and slows down. But I can tell even now, in a month or two, there’s quite a difference.”

Logan Health recommends the BE FAST acronym to remember signs of stroke: Balance, (dizziness,) Eyes (vision changes,) Face drooping, Arm and leg weakness, Slurred or difficult speech and Time to dial 9-1-1.

According to the CDC, patients who arrive at the emergency room within three hours of their first symptoms often have less disability three months after a stroke than those who received delayed care.

To learn more about stroke prevention and recovery, go to Logan Health’s website at www.logan.org and search for stroke.

Reporter Taylor Inman can be reached at 406-758-4433 or by emailing tinman@dailyinterlake.com