Kari Dunning explains the hope she has for stroke survivors in this talk and clarifies that strokes often start with arms feeling heavy and when they start feeling they are harder to move, as well as speaking and words get less clear. This can be imagined as mumbling.
Overall she shared that 1 out of 6 people experience a stroke in their lifetime. A stroke happens when there is a lack of blood going to the brain. This is followed by part if the brain dying and brain cells, also know as neurons. Everyone has billions of neurons in their brain and those neurons work together and build pathways. Those pathways then go from the brain to the muscles and make them move, make a person grab and walk.
When a stroke takes place the signals from brain to the body parts get disruptet.
And this is the reason why people can‘t move their hands, feet or their arm after.
But the positive side is that the brain can reconnect. This in specific is called neuroplasticity.
In her practice she uses TMS, which can look inside the brain. With a device you can check where a connection from the brain to the body is and where it isn‘t.
Since the stroke is clearly damaging the brain, reconnecting takes time and much practice and this continuously. A positive process will only be visible with persistence. But there is a way since is proven by science that the brain can rewire for which reason this woman is persistently fighting and hoping.