Nurse practitioner's quick action saves community garden pioneer

Like most days, Joyce Moty was planning to visit Bradner P-Patch, the community garden she helped start at Bradner Gardens Park near her home in Seattle.

Moty is a fixture there – and a pioneer.

In the 1990s, she was among a group of neighborhood activists who helped save the land from development and preserve it as an open space by expanding the community garden and park.

On this July morning, Moty's day started oddly. For an hour or so, she couldn't move her right arm. She brushed it off. Maybe she'd slept on it. She still managed to have breakfast and read the newspaper online, all with one hand.

Next, Moty – then 79 – tried to take care of some bookkeeping for the garden. Trying to calculate some payments, the arithmetic confused her. Frustrated, she stopped, assuming her brain fog would dissipate.

She was due to meet a friend for a picnic lunch at Bradner. Moty planned to pick up sandwiches at a deli. But when she called her friend to discuss their order, she couldn't remember the name of the deli. She also stumbled on her words. Her friend waited patiently for Moty to get her message across.

Soon after, she felt normal again.

Before getting lunch, Moty drove to the park to put a reservation notice on the picnic shelter they'd planned to use. She filled it out, taped it to the shelter and began walking back to her car when she saw her friend and fellow gardener Pamela Williams.

Moty animatedly told Williams about her day so far. But her sentences came out chopped and nonsensical. The right side of her face drooped.

Williams, a nurse practitioner, immediately suspected that her friend was having a stroke.

She took Moty's arm and said: "Joyce, your words aren't making sense. You need to go to the hospital."

At the hospital, tests showed that Moty had a blood clot in her brain. Doctors were able to perform a procedure called a thrombectomy to remove the clots and restore blood flow.

The next morning, a handful of therapists visited Moty to test her movement, cognitive functioning, balance and speech. She had no deficits from the stroke and was released from the hospital the next morning. Her doctor told her how lucky she was.

Seeking further explanation, doctors did more tests. They found that Moty had a small atrial flutter in her heart that could have contributed to the stroke. She was prescribed blood thinners and cholesterol medication as preventive measures.

Moty credits her good fortune to a healthy lifestyle that included weekly 5-mile walks with friends in addition to her frequent gardening. And for being in the right place at the right time, especially since she missed warning signs such as her arm weakness and slurred speech.

"I am so lucky that Pamela identified my symptoms and knew that time was of the essence," she said.

Williams was honored to help.

"Joyce is an inspiration and a role model," she said. "A lot of us feel a kinship with her for her work to protect nature and open space."

True to form, community-minded Moty shared her story in an email that went to more than 4,000 Seattle urban gardeners, with a link to the warning signs of a stroke.

"I wanted them to know that stroke can happen to anyone and how to recognize the signs," she said. "But I also wanted to tell them how the community garden saved my life."

Now, nearly two years later, Moty remains active with walking, yoga and, of course, gardening.

Stories From the Heart chronicles the inspiring journeys of heart disease and stroke survivors, caregivers and advocates.