They’re fighters in the mental and physical sense. They keep going, even when exhaustion or frustration threatens to stymie their efforts.
For the members of the Second Chance Society, life is to be savored to its fullest. Established in 1977 at Alexian Brothers Medical Center in Elk Grove Village, the group provides social activities, friendship, support, encouragement and a forum for anyone who has suffered catastrophic illness or injury.
“It’s open to anyone recovering from physical limitations,” says Marcy Barish, recreational therapist at Alexian Brothers and hospital liaison. “We have members recovering from strokes, suffering from multiple sclerosis–there’s quite a variety.”
Originally, the Second Chance Society was a support group for stroke victims, but it has expanded over the years. Many of the physical limitations members face are the same no matter what their underlying cause. Members see the group as an extension of recovery work begun in the hospital.
“When a person is in the hospital, they’re too busy getting well to think of anything else,” explains Denise Chudzik of Addison, president and one of Second Chance Society’s founding members.
As patients go through rehabilitation, they learn how to become self-sufficient, but social skills can take a back seat.
“Sometimes people become socially isolated,” Chudzik says. “You get so into yourself.”
That’s why socialization is one of Second Chance’s primary focuses. Among the activities it offers are a picnic, Cubs outing, miniature golf, bowling and boat rides.
These events offer a safe environment for individuals to try relearned skills. According to Jill Milner, clinical administrative director of the Rehabilitation Institute of Chicago at Alexian Brothers Medical Center, the average stroke victim stays in the hospital five to seven days, followed by two to three weeks at a rehabilitation facility.
“During that time, they’re doing physical therapy, working on basic kinds of things and learning their overall medications,” Milner says. “They may be learning to talk again, but they learn one-on-one. The next step is learning how to talk to groups of people. What better way to do this than with a group of people who aren’t going to laugh at them?”
Barish affirms that much of the group’s work is therapeutic. “Say they want to play golf. There are different ways you can adapt the game,” she explains. “Some have to learn to golf one-handed, or you have to adapt for an amputee whose balance is off. Maybe they can’t play as well as before, but they can still play.”
Chudzik acknowledges that it often takes time for an individual to feel normal again after an illness. One goes through a grieving process for the body one used to have. “In the beginning, you’re not sure of yourself, you’re not sure of anything,” she says. “It took me two years (before) I could consider myself recovered.”
A blocked carotid artery left Chudzik completely paralyzed on her left side when she was 24 years old and five months pregnant with her son, Adam. She had rehabilitation during her pregnancy, and the baby became her therapy, his daily care making her more self-sufficient after his birth. Yet she jumped at the chance to help herself even more when Second Chance was formed nearly two years after her stroke.
“What we didn’t realize was that we were giving each other peer support,” Chudzik says of the group’s early days.
It’s that support that makes Second Chance attractive. Longtime member Josie Moy of Buffalo Grove says she likes to encourage new members. “I see people now the way I was, and I tell them I was there before,” says Moy, who had a stroke in 1991. “I tell them to keep going, that they’ll get there.”
Some members know they may never reach the hypothetical “there,” but just having someone to talk to can help tremendously with depression, particularly when a disability isn’t readily apparent, such as the early stages of multiple sclerosis.
“The problem with depression is you don’t want to do anything, but you have to do something to make it better,” says Arlington Heights resident John Falkowski, who suffered a brain injury after falling off a scaffold in a construction accident in 1994. Falkowski had surgery to remove a baseball-sized blood clot. He still suffers from reduced hearing, tinnitus (ringing in the ear) and fullness in his left ear, which causes vertigo.
Something as simple as looking the wrong way can cause him to lose his balance, and Falkowski has been unable to return to his job as a bricklayer.
“Things you wouldn’t even think twice about, you suddenly can’t do,” Falkowski says. “Psychologically, it’s devastating.”
Falkowski’s wife, Maryann, has also benefited from the group.
“So little is known about head injuries,” she says. “Until you’re faced with it, you don’t know what you’re up against.”
When you come to group meetings, she says, “you see other people with basically the same injury, other people with hearing troubles, speaking difficulties. You talk to their spouses and care givers and compare notes. It helps you cope.”
Coping with reality means fighting the odds for these survivors. Like Falkowski, Jim Knippen of Hoffman Estates is grateful to be alive. In 1985, doctors gave him a 60 percent chance of survival after removal of a large, benign brain tumor that left him paralyzed on his left side. From the beginning of his rehabilitation, however, Knippen tried to make the best of his situation.
“I needed to show that I had to get up and go and wanted to make things better,” Knippen says.
Unlike Falkowski, Knippen was able to return to work as a foreman for Dean Foods for several years, until he broke his ankle and decided it was a good time to stop working. Now, like Falkowski, he keeps active by volunteering at the Rehabilitation Institute of Chicago at Alexian Brothers and going to Second Chance activities.
The group has several hundred names on its mailing list, but attendance at activities averages only 20 to 40 people.
Chudzik says some individuals only need or want to attend Second Chance for a short time, while others view their involvement as long term. “This (group) is a stepping stone to the rehabilitation process that can take months or years,” she says.
The group’s activities give its members an opportunity for fun.
“It alleviates the boredom,” says Frank Walsh of Des Plaines. Walsh’s speech is still affected by the stroke he had 14 years ago. He also suffers from a degenerative brain disorder and gets around with the aid of a walker. Yet these limitations don’t prevent this 76-year-old from playing Santa Claus at the group’s annual Christmas party.
In fact, overcoming limitations is the name of the game for these fighters. Chudzik is proud of the associate’s degree in human services she earned with honors in 1996 from College of DuPage. Falkowski is grateful he’s able to walk and tries to maintain his sense of humor and buoy the spirits of those around him.
As for Knippen, the alternative to not having brain surgery wasn’t very attractive–he simply wouldn’t be here.
“It proves that if you can fight back,” Knippen says, “there really is a second chance.”
