'Lost in a frozen body': Austin ice climber returns to mountains after stroke

'Hope'. (This is the whole stroke rehab problem in a nutshell. 'Hope'. Survivors shouldn't need hope, their doctors and therapists should have EXACT PROTOCOLS TO DELIVER 100% RECOVERY! Your hospital doesn't have that? You don't have a functioning stroke hospital!)

'Lost in a frozen body': Austin ice climber returns to mountains after stroke

As Phillip Engle watched the blockbuster movie "Dune" in a theater in December 2021, the Austin father cringed because the movie sound suddenly became unbearable. After the film ended, he had trouble walking and needed the handrails for balance.

Once back at home, his daughter noticed he was talking funny. They rushed him to the hospital, where he had a stroke while in the emergency room in the wee hours of the next day.

By the end of that week, the former marathon runner and mountain climber could not walk, could not talk and could not pick up a foam cup.

"I was in shock. I felt like I was lost in a frozen body," Engle said.

He began a journey from the abyss of despair to an extraordinary recovery and a new path where he now counsels stroke patients on their rehabilitation journey. Aiding in his recovery, Engle said, is the desire to return outdoors and climb mountains again with his children.

Yearly, more than 795,000 people have a stroke in the United States, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. More than 137,000 die of a stroke each year in the U.S., the CDC calculates. The chances of a recovery are increased if a person gets to a hospital within 4½ hours after the stroke ― the window in which medication can be given to break up the blood clot causing it.

One of the most common risk factors is high blood pressure, which Engle had. For him and many others, exercise and fitness can create a false sense of security that they are safe.

"It's so much easier to prevent a stroke than to go through the years or thousands of hours to recover from a stroke," said Dr. Robert Lee, medical director of stroke and neurological recovery at St. David’s Rehabilitation Hospital, who treated Engle.

Lee also cited other risk factors, including high cholesterol, heart defects, diabetes, obesity and smoking.

Engle's stroke began as cascading episodes, ministrokes, on Dec. 10. They were followed by the big stroke Dec. 11 and the worsening of symptoms over the next week. He had difficulty moving his right side. At one point, Engle needed a wheelchair to get around.

"It was a weird collection of symptoms," Engle said. "I had gone from being functional to being dysfunctional."

His family doctor explained that stroke symptoms can worsen over time and said Engle needed intense therapy.

Climbing back up

Engle entered St. David's Rehabilitation Hospital to participate in the Young Stroke Survivors Program — an intense six-hour-a-day regimen of physical, occupational and speech therapy. When Engle arrived for rehabilitation, he had trouble moving his hands, dragged his foot and lacked balance, and it took great effort "just walking from the bed to the door," he said.

 

"He was discoordinated," Lee recalled.

Life after stroke:Marine brings combat, stroke recovery lessons into role as Lakeway hospital chaplain

On Engle's second day of rehab, after six hours of therapy, a therapist handed him putty to squeeze with his right hand. The task seemed impossible, Engle said, questioning the empathy of his therapists and nurses for his plight.

Then a man who sat beside him, who had survived a similar stroke, offered words of comfort. "I was where you are two weeks ago," he said.

"That gave me hope," Engle said. "It was hope that got me out of bed in the morning. It was more significant in my life than the stroke."(This is the whole stroke rehab problem in a nutshell. 'Hope'. Survivors shouldn't need hope, their doctors and therapists should have EXACT PROTOCOLS TO DELIVER 100% RECOVERY! Your hospital doesn't have that? You don't have a functioning stroke hospital!)

Engle began to push himself, to do more than asked, to practice his exercises even at night. He gave himself a goal: Go ice climbing a year later.

Retraining the brain

Lee said goals are important and often more intense for the one-third of stroke survivors younger than 65. The Young Stroke Survivors Program was created with this group in mind, but there is no age cutoff. It's more the state of mind, Lee said. These stroke patients need intensive therapy, Lee said, because often they want to return to work and need to relearn the skills to do so.

With strokes, time matters. Early medical intervention helps lessen the damage, and early intensive therapy helps rebuild the brain's neural pathways to regain skills that were lost.

"Usually, three to six months after a stroke the brain is most receptive," Lee said, and patients "make the most gains."

Improvements can still come after six months, Lee said. Research now shows the brain can continue to make new pathways. It just takes more intensive therapy than in the first six months.