Live Without Fear

LIVE WITHOUT FEAR, STROKE VICTIM SAYS CARNEGIE TEACHER FOLLOWS OWN COURSE, LEARNS TO WALK, TALK, WRITE AGAIN;

Gary Robertson Times-Dispatch Staff Writer. Richmond Times - Dispatch. Richmond, Va.: Feb 09, 1997. Page. B.1

"So, I tried to get up. And as I stood up, I went to take a step. . . . It was like Frankenstein," [Patrick] Morin said, stiffening his body and leaning to one side.

Morin's mother, Kathleen Lloyd, who lives in upstate New York, is a nurse. And the first thing she noticed when her son got on the phone was his slurred speech. For the first time in her life, she didn't tell him to get out of bed and walk around if he wanted to feel better.

[Kate] Connolly wrapped a shirt around Morin and then, at 125 pounds, supported her husband's 210 pounds as she carried him down two flights of stairs and lifted him into his truck.

Copyright Richmond Newspapers, Incorporated Feb 09, 1997 (ljb)

Early in the morning of Dec. 28, 1995, Patrick Morin fell out of bed.

The trim, muscular, 27-year-old instructor for Dale Carnegie Training hit the floor of his townhouse in Henrico County with a thump.

And he started laughing.

" I was laughing. My wife was laughing. . . . I mean, when was the last time you fell out of bed? Maybe when you were a kid and they had to put books around you to keep you in."

His wife finally asked if he hurt anything.

" Oh, yeah. I'm all right," Morin told her.

" So, I tried to get up. And as I stood up, I went to take a step. . . . It was like Frankenstein," Morin said, stiffening his body and leaning to one side.

" There's a trouser press at the end of my bed, and I went crashing into it. My wife looked up again and said, `Are you OK?'

" And I said, `Yeah, this is really weird. I must have slept funny. My entire right side is asleep.'

" I said, `I'm going to take a shower. . . . I'll shake it off.' I tried to take another step, and I fell into a dresser at the end of the bed."

Morin suggested they call his mother.

Kate Connolly had been his bride of three months and was a manager at Continental Cablevision.

" It was kind of funny," Connolly said. "I mean, we'd only been newlyweds for three months and something happens and he wants to call his mom. And I said to myself, `Well, I guess that's all right.' "

It was a call that might have saved his life.

Morin's mother, Kathleen Lloyd, who lives in upstate New York, is a nurse. And the first thing she noticed when her son got on the phone was his slurred speech. For the first time in her life, she didn't tell him to get out of bed and walk around if he wanted to feel better.

She told him to get to a hospital as fast as he could.

Connolly wrapped a shirt around Morin and then, at 125 pounds, supported her husband's 210 pounds as she carried him down two flights of stairs and lifted him into his truck.

In the three years they had lived in Richmond, they never had had a reason to go to a hospital. Now, bleary-eyed in the early-morning darkness, they were looking for blue "H" signs on the highway, trying to find directions to St. Mary's Hospital.

Finally, they arrived at the emergency room.

Morin: "I'm still thinking, `Maybe I've slept the wrong way and my body is soon going to wake up.' "

Connolly: "OK, I'm thinking, `He'll come in here and they'll do something and then we'll go back home.' "

But Morin's body didn't wake up, and the doctors wouldn't let him go home.

For four days, physicians searched for a reason why a seemingly healthy young man who never got sick suddenly was so ill.

On Jan. 2, 1996, Dr. Robert J. Cohen, a neurologist, entered Morin's room about 5:30 a.m.

Morin: "He says, `Can you stand up?' So, I get up. Then he says, `Can you sit in that chair?' So, I sit in the chair."

Then, Cohen draws closer.

Morin: "He said, `Well, we've found out. It was a stroke. You've had a stroke.' "

The words rang through Morin's head like a death sentence.

" If you could put a phrase to it, my reaction," Morin said, "it would be `I'm not done yet. . . . This can't happen. . . . It's not over.'

" It was like somebody opened a valve on the bottom of my feet and drained all the energy out of me."

The stroke left Morin with slurred speech, and his right leg and his right hand were paralyzed.

All he could think was: "I've had a stroke. My career is over. I'll never be able to talk to anybody again."

As a Dale Carnegie instructor, Morin trains clients in management skills, sales and customer relations, among other topics.

He needs to be able to lead, inspire and motivate. And to do that, he has to be able to talk.

A year ago, he couldn't.

Over the past 13 months, Morin has had to learn to talk again, walk again, write again.

The Dale Carnegie program constantly emphasizes the positive and the ability of people to control their lives. Not infrequently since his stroke, Morin has had to give himself a few motivational talks.

After graduating from Oswego State University in New York with a degree in marketing, Morin first worked for General Electric Co. and then was employed briefly on Wall Street as a broker.

But he said he didn't find what he was looking for until he moved to Richmond in 1993 and joined Dale Carnegie.

" I fell in love with the idea of Dale Carnegie," Morin said. "I guess it ties into my stroke and how I feel about it.

" I feel people have so much more potential than they realize. But most of us live so far within our potential, it should almost embarrass us. Dale Carnegie helps people reach their potential."

But Morin said it took a Catholic priest to restore his confidence in his own potential.

As his physician was leaving his room after breaking the bad news about his stroke, Morin said the priest suddenly appeared at his door.

" I'd never seen him before. And to this day I don't know who it was," said Morin, who attends St. Michael's Catholic Church in western Henrico.

" He asked me why I was so sad. And, I told him, `I had all this potential and now it's slipped away.' Those were my exact words.

" Then he asked me what made my potential any less than it had been a few days before. That really had an impact.

" It was no longer, `I'm going to feel sorry for myself.' It was, `I'm going to do something for myself. I've still got the potential.'

" So I could either live my life in fear, or I could live it with excitement. That doesn't necessarily mean it eliminates all the worry.

" You live with the feeling of, `Will it happen again? Is my arm falling asleep, or am I having another stroke?' "

Morin and his wife believe living through the ordeal has changed them for the better in measurable ways.

" I treasure every day," Morin said. "I treasure every little minute, because it may or may not be here again."

He also believes he's become more passionate about what he talks about, more empathetic about others' feelings. He even thinks he's become funnier.

Everything is not so serious anymore.

He also said he's found a strength in his wife that he never had known was there.

" She's great in a crisis," he said. "I couldn't have done this without her."

For her part, Connolly said her crisis training -- especially in dealing with men -- probably can be attributed to growing up with eight brothers. She was the only girl in the family.

" There was always something going on," she said with a laugh.

Connolly said her husband's stroke has given her a big-picture view of life and what can happen in it.

" I'm not worrying so much," she said. "Some of the trivial things that used to frustrate me don't really matter any more.

" You're thankful for what you have . . . your family and your friends. Faith also has a lot to do with it. I know now that God doesn't send anything your way that you wouldn't be able to handle."

Last week, Morin and his wife went to Johns Hopkins University so he could be tested further. They learned that an artery in his brain is 30 percent closed with scar tissue.

" When we were driving back," Morin recalled, "my wife said, `At least now we know.' We still don't know what caused the stroke, but now we do know where it is and that it's healing.

" The chances of a recurrent stroke are high. But in our minds, the fear is gone. I'm not going to drop dead tomorrow."

Morin paused.

" Who knows? I might. But we're going on with our lives."

Connolly: "You can't stop living."

Morin and his wife closed on a new house Jan. 31.