‘I Can Look Fine. You Have No Idea What’s Going On in My Brain’

The Rev. Harrison Johnson Jr. was doing what he had done countless times before: Serving God and serving others. He had finished playing piano at a funeral and was nearing the end of his sermon when he felt a powerful pop in his head.

Then the vision in his right eye began to dim.

After the service, Johnson came down from the pulpit and wandered around the chapel, unable to communicate clearly. His manager recognized that something was terribly wrong. A funeral home driver lifted Johnson into a limousine and rushed him to Ascension Saint Agnes Hospital in Baltimore.

LEARN MORE: How One News Error Shook Baltimore’s Faith Community

Johnson vaguely remembers arriving at the emergency room. His next clear memory came several weeks later.

“I remember waking up in the hospital, but it had been several weeks,” he said. “They put a drainage tube in my head. They kept me there in ICU as they drained the fluid off of my head.”

Long Recovery Journey

Johnson spent about three weeks in intensive care. When he initially regained consciousness, he did not know who or where he was. Asked to identify a family member, he mistook the person for a childhood pet.

“It still troubles me today to think that there’s this time period, this gap,” Johnson said. “I wasn’t aware of anything. Just to know how the mind works and how it can be taken from us just like that.”

Johnson’s experience is deeply personal, but it reflects a devastating national disparity.

The risk of having a stroke is nearly twice as high for non-Hispanic Black adults as it is for white adults, according to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention⁠. Black adults also have one of the nation’s highest stroke death rates.

More than 795,000 people in the United States experience a stroke each year — roughly one every 40 seconds. Strokes can occur at any age, although the risk increases with age. High blood pressure, diabetes, high cholesterol, smoking, and obesity are among the leading risk factors.

For Black Americans, those risks are increased by inequitable access to medical care, healthy food, safe places to exercise, and other conditions that shape health long before a patient reaches an emergency room. The American Heart Association⁠ reports that hypertension develops earlier and is often more severe in Black people than in white people.

Nearly 60% of Black adults have high blood pressure, compared with about 45% of white adults, according to the CDC⁠. Among adults advised to take medication for hypertension, Black adults also have the lowest rate of controlled blood pressure.

But statistics do not fully explain what happens after a person survives.

Invisible Struggle

Johnson, founder and senior pastor of Word 4 Life Ministries, estimates that he has recovered about 80% to 85% of his previous abilities. He has learned, however, that recovery is not linear.

“Most folk look at stroke as being paralyzed, or an arm that won’t move, a hand that won’t move,” but a stroke can affect much more than just motor skills, he says. “The mental part of it is one of the biggest factors that folk just don’t understand.” 

Even as his physical recovery progresses, Johnson struggles with things people can’t see.

“I can look fine on the outside, but you have no idea what’s going on in my brain,” he said. “Sometimes I get stuck with my words. I get stuck with my thoughts.”

Even navigation had to be relearned. Familiar routes disappeared from his mental map. He could no longer picture how to get from his home to a nearby store or visualize the layout of familiar places. Slowly, that ability is returning. 

“I’m taking my time now,” he said. “I’m being patient with it, and it’s coming back, little by little. I celebrate every step.”

His older sister, Tracy Johnson Chester, became his primary caregiver. She drove him, prepared meals, stayed overnight, and attended stroke-education classes so she could better understand his condition.

“I don’t think I would have made it this far if it wasn’t for her,” Johnson says. “She refused to let me go alone. She said she wanted the information as well.”

Setbacks and Success

A year after his stroke, Johnson began experiencing seizures. He has had eight and now takes two medications twice daily. The seizures brought new frustration, including difficulty remembering the key of a familiar song.

He began writing down songs and their keys. A minister of music with perfect pitch helps him find his way back into the music when memory fails.

Johnson has made other adjustments, too. He stretches, exercises, reads, and completes word puzzles to enhance his focus. Because insufficient sleep may contribute to seizures, his physicians have stressed the importance of rest.

His return to the pulpit has been gradual. At first, he wondered whether he could continue pastoring. He offered to step back and let another minister handle more of the church’s day-to-day leadership. His congregation refused to give up on him.

Johnson began preaching once a month and now has progressed to twice monthly.

“I believe that was God saying, ‘You’re not chickening out that easy. After all you’ve been through, you can’t get out of it that easy,’” he says.

Spotting the Signs

Johnson said one of the hardest parts of his journey was the silence of pastors and ministries he had supported over the years. Few called or visited when he disappeared from church livestreams and public ministry.

“Some days, all I wanted was just to have somebody hear me,” he said.

He now urges churches to treat stroke recovery as a long-term ministry of presence, patience, and practical support.

The CDC recommends remembering “BE. F.A.S.T.,” an acronym to help recognize the signs of a stroke and what action to take: Balance loss, Eyesight changes, Facial drooping, Arm weakness, Speech difficulty and Time to call 911. Immediate emergency care can lessen brain damage and long-term disability.

Now, two years after his stroke, Johnson has joined a support group and uses his experience to encourage other survivors. His recovery remains unfinished, but hope has returned.

“I look back and I made it,” he said. “I wouldn’t change anything because it drew me closer to God. I’m in a good place now.”