1-On-1 Counselling and Life Coaching to Help You “Make It Happen”

Welcome! I’m Zahava Starak, and I’m a Counsellor and Life Coach based in Brisbane, Queensland Australia. Do you feel frustrated or trapped by your situation or relationships? Or maybe you feel impatient to fulfil a goal, or confused about how to get to where you want to be with your relationships, family, career or lifestyle…

Counselling or Life Coaching May Help

As a registered counsellor for 25 years, I’ve helped hundreds of clients to help themselves overcome the obstacles that stand in their way to enjoying the life they want to lead.

Yes it’s a cliché, but “Life is not a rehearsal – this is it“. When you really understand the truth of that statement, you become motivated to take control and “make it happen“. I never want you to wake up one morning and feel regret that you didn’t follow through on what you really wanted to do with your life.

I Offer You Down-to-earth Support

I practise a down-to-earth, hype-free approach to Counselling and Coaching. My sole focus is on helping you…

Make what you want, happen.

If things aren’t as you’d like them to be, I can’t wave a wand and change your life for you. But what I can do is to act as a guide to bring about change within yourself. If you have any questions or enquiries, please feel free to contact me.

What do you want to do now?

- Find out more about Counselling
- Find out more about Life Coaching
- What’s the difference between Counselling and Life Coaching?
- Contact me with your comments or questions

Happy christmas to those who celebrate. I’m writing this on Boxing day here in Brisbane, at the hospital next to Zahava. She is sitting in her oxford chair reading a cosmopolitan magazine Phil bought for her.

Since updating you last October Zahava has slowly and steadily progressed. The improvement curve is very slow, but it is heading in the right direction.

The trachy remains the big goal – to have it removed. Zahava had surgery on her throat a month ago to remove some scar tissue that had built up from having the trachy for a long time. The tissue blocks her airway, which must be cleared in order to breath without the trachy.

Zahava had the surgery under a local anaesthetic. She took about two weeks to heal properly, which was about two weeks ago. Since then her speech pathologists have begun the cuff deflations again, which is where the balloon that protects her airway is deflated so she has to handle protecting it herself.

When the balloon is down a speaking valve can be attached so air passes through Zahava’s vocal cords and she can talk. Her voice is quite “wet”, covered in saliva and gurgling, but she can say understandable words in a deep voice.

The whole process is tasking on her breathing, so sessions last for 30 minutes to an hour. The goal is to get these sessions happening every day and increase how long they go for. When Zahava can tolerate the balloon being down all the time and handle the breathing and swallowing etc by herself, the trachy can come out. At the moment it’s about stability and building endurance.

The rest of her body is improving slowly. Zahava goes for short walks with her physio and a assistant holding her up with a walker with wheels. Her left side is good, her right side is slowly getting better. Her left hand works fine, her right hand is getting better.

We do daily exercises to help Zahava with her swallow/mouth and her right arm, in addition to the treatment she gets from the hospital staff.

In terms of mood, Zahava is relaxed, except during the cuff deflations where she does a lot of coughing. Most of the time she jokes around with us, smiling and laughing, has long naps, watches tv and reads magazines. The nurses have regular treatments for Zahava to keep things stable and for the most part the days follow a similar pattern.

Visitors are welcome to pop in for short visits any time. Zahava can remember all of her long time friends very well and will greet you with a big smile. Her concentration and short term memory isn’t great, but in general she is just as she always has been.

Happy new year from all of us at the hospital.

Yaro

Hello again, here is the latest news on the recovery of my mother, Zahava.

Zahava has been through a tough month or so. Unfortunately about six weeks ago her active left hand pulled out the trachy tube from her throat one night on the weekend. This is not a good thing as it causes quite a bit of trauma and she needs it in to help her breath.

The emergency team were called in and put in a new trachy, but unfortunately the damage was done, setting us back a few weeks.

Since then she has been on a roller coaster ride of respiratory issues, often resulting in changes to plans at the last minute, multiple doses of antibiotics just in case of infection, and several not-so-fun late night emergencies. We have been taking it day by day, dealing with each challenge as it comes.

The week before last Zahava had another new trachy put in place, this time deliberately, with a new mechanism that allows some of the secretions to be removed from the top of her cuff. Since then she has had a stable 10 days thanks to some extra cautious planning doing not much more than the basics.

The goal now is to maintain the stability and slowly again begin the process towards removing the trachy from her throat so she can drink, eat and hopefully talk again. In order for this to happen the important thing is for Zahava to practice swallowing, which is what we do every day.

Physio continues, with Zahava having taken a few steps standing up, albeit with several people holding her up. She tires very quickly and sleeps a couple of hours after most physio sessions.

The timeframe for her recovery is unknown, but very likely we are talking years for a complete recovery. For the moment we take a little tiny step forward each day, with the main current goal of getting the trachy out of her throat.

Visitors Welcome

I asked Zahava last week if she would like guests to come visit and she said she is ready for people to come and say hello (with a nod of her head).

Bear in mind her short term memory is not good and she cannot talk to you, so if you do decide to come visit you have to be able to carry a one-way conversation and stick to positive subjects. Zahava would like to hear about the good things going on in your life. She can listen, and respond with smiles, yes and no with her head, facial expressions and hold your hand with her left hand.

She has good long term memory, so will remember who you are assuming she knew you before the stroke.

The best times to visit are Monday at 5Pm, Wednesday at 4PM, Thursday at 5pm or Saturday and Sunday from 3pm onwards. Phil or myself should be with Zahava during these times.

Officially visiting hours are 10am to 1pm and 3pm to 8pm. Chances are if you show up in the mornings Zahava will be working with a physio, speech pathologist, doctor, nurse or occupational therapist, so I recommend the times suggested. I also recommend you plan a short visit of about 30 minutes maximum.

Zahava is located on Level 7BNorth of the Royal Brisbane in the main building, Ned Hanlon, currently bed 48 (check at reception as the bed number can change as we get moved around if you are reading this long after the publication date).

As always, please please please keep the prayers coming, the well wishes and positive thoughts – Zahava needs it all if she is to get through this and recover something like the life she had before.

Thank you for the support.

Yaro and Phil and of course, Zahava.

Today I am happy to report that Zahava’s progress continues in a positive direction. She is now awake the entire day and we spend much of the time making jokes and laughing with her, which is wonderful. She still cannot talk due to the trachy in her throat, but she can communicate a lot using her face and head for many non-verbal expressions.

Her swallow is continuing to improve and we hope that eventually she will be able to have the trachy removed and can begin the process of rehabilitating her voice and eating food again (at the moment she eats through a tube in her stomach).

Zahava is slowly regaining some movement in the right side of her body, while the left side remains very active and continues to improve as she gains more specific control over her leg, arm and hand. Every day the physio works on her strength to move towards sitting, standing and eventually walking again.

We still have a long way to go but have high hopes that the current progress forwards will continue. It remains challenging while in hospital as Zahava requires constant help and medications, so we appreciate the prayers and well wishes continuing to help us get closer to bringing her home one day.

Thank you again for your love and thoughts,

Yaro and Phil

I have not updated this page in a while as there was nothing significant to report, however today we had a positive change.

For the last several weeks Zahava has remained in mostly the same condition with our focus on swallow training to hopefully one day remove the trachy from her throat so she can breath normally through her mouth and possibly speak again too. This is still our main focus now as the speech pathologists help her improve her swallow, tongue and mouth control so her brain can learn how to complete a swallow 100%. At the moment she can swallow but some of it goes into her lungs so she needs the trachy.

The main goodnews we had today is that Zahava can now communicate with us via nodding and shaking her head to say yes or no. I first saw her nod her head a couple of days ago but I was not sure it was deliberate and could not get her to repeat it. Today on many occasions she nodded her head to say yes, shook her head for no and was very alert with eyes open. She also read some words on cards sent to her and confirmed that she could read by nodding her head.

Naturally we are elated that we now have a means to communicate to Zahava and we hope that improvements continue, although we remain patient – there is a long way to go yet.

This week Zahava’s sister Diane and brother in law Larry arrive from Canada, so we are pleased to have more family here with us.

Thanks again for your ongoing support, prayers and expressions of love for Zahava. Please keep it coming as she has a lot more work to do.

Yaro and Phil

Zahava remains in a stable condition in the stroke ward. Her alertness remains the same, spending most of the time resting or in some kind of semi-conscious state – it is difficult to know exactly how much she is aware of. She does open her eyes occasionally and shows deliberate communication with us, but tires very quickly.

In terms of her body, she takes minor steps forward requiring less support from medicine and equipment, although she still requires a trachy in her throat to help deal with secretions.

Our focus now is building up her swallow strength so she can eventually have the trachy taken from her throat. Beyond that we hope and pray that her brain is finding a way to rewire passed the damaged areas so she will regain more consciousness and be able to talk again one day.

Thanks once again for your ongoing prayers and support, we have only begun to climb this mountain.

Yaro and Phil.