Engineer becomes successful artist after stroke rewires his brain, page 1

Engineer becomes successful artist after stroke rewires his brain

www.mailonsunday.co.uk

A former engineer who was disabled and living on benefits has turned his life around - after a stroke rewired his brain and turned him into an artist.

[snip]

But incredibly the cerebral haemorrhage turned out to be an astonishing piece of good fortune.

For it 'rewired' part of his brain and spawned an artistic flair he never previously possessed.

This article absolutely amazes me. My grandmother had a major stroke some years ago which paralyzed her right side. Prior to having the stroke she was quite active in traditional grandmotherly passtimes like canning, needlepoint, and crocheting. After the stroke, she was unable to do these things, but she taught herself to write with her left hand and wrote some very moving poems and some songs, neither of which anyone in my family ever knew her to do before the stroke.

I'd love to know if this was a direct result of the stroke or an after effect of the body trying to find some way to outlet emotion & creativity, rerouting away from physically expressive pathways previously available before the stroke towards more creative, artistic pathways. Could it be that we all have an artist hidden inside us somewhere and we just need to find a way to tap into that artistic flair (other than via a debillitating stroke, obviously.)?

www.mailonsunday.co.uk
(visit the link for the full news article)

Edited to fix link

[edit on 19-8-2008 by burdman30ott6]