A personal reflection on loss, survival, and the moments that remain
By Ken Vantroba, creator of Cuddle Spoons - September 6th 2026.
People often say, “Keep the faith.” They mean well. They want to give you hope when your life has become hard, uncertain, or painful. But when you have lived with a serious disability for years—especially after losing the life you once knew—faith is not always a bright light that stays steady. Sometimes it flickers. Sometimes it becomes so faint that you wonder whether it is still there at all.
I know that feeling. On December 11, 1988, when I was 26 years old, I suffered a severe vascular attack, or stroke. In a moment, the future I thought I had was taken away from me. I spent about a year and a half in hospitals and rehabilitation. I had to face a body that no longer moved or responded the way it once had. The strength in my arms and hands was limited. Spasticity affected my arms and legs. A motorized wheelchair became part of my life—and I came to understand that it probably always would be.
Before that day, I had plans. I had work, friends, independence, and someone special in my life. I had the ordinary confidence of a young man who believed tomorrow would build naturally on today. After the stroke, tomorrow no longer looked like a promise. It looked like a question I did not know how to answer.
People may look at a survivor and see courage. They may say, “You are so strong,” because they see the wheelchair, the effort, and the fact that I am still here. What they do not always see is the private grief. They do not see the life that disappeared, the friendships that faded, the opportunities that never returned, or the loneliness that can settle over a person when everyone else seems to keep moving forward.
That is why I say this honestly: faith can fade. But memories do not.
The Day My Life Divided Into Before and After
There are moments that divide a life into two parts: before and after. December 11, 1988, was that moment for me. Before, I was 26 years old and building a future. After, I was trying to understand what had happened to my body, my plans, and my identity.
A major disability does not affect only muscles, balance, speech, or movement. It reaches into almost every corner of life. It can change how you work, how you travel, how other people respond to you, and how you see yourself. It can turn simple daily tasks into projects. It can make you depend on other people in ways you never expected. It can also make the world feel as though it was designed for everyone except you.
During rehabilitation, progress can be measured in tiny movements that other people take for granted. A hand opening a little farther. A leg responding after repeated effort. Sitting with better balance. Learning a different way to complete a task. These small victories matter, but they also remind you of how much has changed. Hope and grief can exist in the same room. You can be proud of one inch of progress and still mourn the miles you lost.
When people hear that someone survived a stroke, they may imagine the story is complete: the person lived, received therapy, and came home. But coming home does not mean returning to the old life. Sometimes home is where the full truth becomes clear. The hospital has schedules, therapists, nurses, and daily goals. At home, you meet the empty spaces where your old routines used to be. You notice the places you cannot easily enter, the tasks you cannot do alone, and the people who are no longer beside you.
Survival is not the end of the story. In many ways, it is where the hardest part begins.
When Faith Becomes Tired
Faith is often described as certainty. My experience has been different. Faith can be a question. It can be anger. It can be silence. It can be the smallest part of you that decides to wake up and try again even when you do not feel hopeful.
After enough disappointment, faith can become tired. You may pray for healing and remain disabled. You may pray for companionship and still feel alone. You may work hard, do what people tell you to do, and still find doors closed. You may watch other people reach milestones—careers, marriages, families, travel, celebrations—while your own life feels paused or reduced.
When that happens, telling someone simply to “have more faith” can hurt. It can make the person feel responsible for suffering they did not choose. It can suggest that if they were stronger, more positive, or more spiritual, their life would improve. But disability is not a punishment for weak faith. Pain is not proof that a person has failed. And asking difficult questions does not make someone less worthy of love, respect, or belonging.
My faith has not always felt strong. There have been times when I wondered why my life changed so completely at 26. Why did I lose so much? Why did the people and possibilities that once surrounded me become memories? Why was I left to carry a future so different from the one I had imagined?
I do not have a neat answer. Real life rarely gives us one. I have learned that honesty matters more than pretending. If faith is present, it must have room for sorrow. It must have room for frustration, doubt, and even anger. Otherwise, it is not faith for real human beings; it is only a slogan.
Some days, faith means believing that life still has a purpose. Other days, it means continuing without feeling that belief. Sometimes the body keeps going while the heart struggles to catch up. That, too, is a form of survival.
Memories Refuse to Leave
Memories are different from faith. Faith looks toward something we cannot yet see. Memories look backward at what we know was real. They hold voices, faces, places, and feelings long after the moment has passed.
I remember the person I was before my stroke. I remember what independence felt like. I remember friendships, work, possibilities, and the special person who was part of my life. Those memories can comfort me, but they can also hurt. A good memory is not always gentle. Sometimes it shows you exactly what you lost.
People sometimes tell us not to live in the past. There is wisdom in that, but the phrase can be too simple. The past is not a house we can always walk out of and lock behind us. It lives within us. It shapes our expectations, fears, loves, and identity. For someone whose life changed suddenly, memory becomes evidence that another life existed. It tells us: I was there. I loved. I hoped. I mattered. That life was real.
Disability can make other people see only the present body. They see the wheelchair before they see the person. They may speak slowly even when your mind is clear. They may address the person beside you instead of addressing you. They may assume you have always lived this way, as if you arrived in the world already carrying all these limitations.
But memory protects the fuller story. It reminds me that I am not only what happened to me. I am the young man I once was, the survivor I became, the inventor who continued thinking and creating, and the person who still wants connection, happiness, and meaning.
My body changed. My circumstances changed. Some relationships changed. But the memories of love, laughter, ambition, and belonging did not ask permission to stay. They stayed anyway.
The Loneliness People Do Not See
One of the hardest parts of long-term disability is not always physical pain. It is the loneliness that can grow around it. The world often celebrates dramatic recovery stories, but it is less comfortable with lives that remain complicated. People admire the person who “beats the odds.” They do not always know how to stand beside the person who continues living with the odds every day.
Friends may drift away, not necessarily because they are cruel, but because your lives no longer move at the same speed. Invitations may decrease because people assume a place is inaccessible or an activity would be difficult. Romantic relationships can become harder because some people see disability before personality. Even ordinary social spaces can create barriers long before anyone says a word.
Over time, being overlooked can make you question your value. You may wonder whether people remember who you were, whether they understand who you still are, or whether your life has become invisible. That is when memories can feel like both friends and witnesses. They remind you that your need for closeness is not unreasonable. You have known connection before, and you know what it means.
I do not want pity. Most disabled people do not. Pity looks down from a safe distance. What we want is recognition. We want people to speak to us, include us, listen to us, and make room for our full humanity. We want the freedom to be funny, frustrated, romantic, creative, stubborn, hopeful, and imperfect. We want to be more than an inspirational lesson in someone else’s day.
A disabled life is still a human life. It contains desire, memory, disappointment, affection, pride, and dreams. The equipment may be visible, but the person inside it is deeper than what the eye can see.
Memories Can Hurt—and Still Be Precious
There is a strange truth about memory: the most painful memories are often painful because they contain something precious. We do not grieve what meant nothing to us. We grieve people, places, abilities, and seasons because they mattered.
I can remember what I lost without allowing loss to be the only meaning of my life. That balance is difficult. Some days, memory pulls backward. It makes me compare the present with the past and see only what is missing. Other days, the same memory gives me a reason to create something new. It tells me that connection matters because I have felt its absence. It tells me that small moments deserve to be protected because life can change without warning.
This is one lesson disability has taught me with painful clarity: do not take an ordinary moment for granted. Sitting across from someone you love, sharing dessert, laughing at something silly, holding a hand, opening a gift, or hearing a familiar voice may not seem important while it is happening. Later, that simple moment may become one of the memories you treasure most.
We often wait for major occasions to show people what they mean to us. We wait for birthdays, anniversaries, holidays, or emergencies. But some of the strongest memories come from small rituals: coffee together in the morning, a favorite song in the car, a private joke, or two people sharing one dessert at the kitchen table.
Memory does not measure the price of a moment. It measures the feeling.
Why I Created Cuddle Spoons
My own experience with loss and memory is part of why I created Cuddle Spoons. On the surface, they are two character spoons designed to fit together—to cuddle. They can help make sharing dessert more playful and memorable. Their curved handles and wrist cords can also be helpful for people with limited hand mobility or strength. But to me, their deeper meaning is not only about spoons.
Cuddle Spoons are about giving two people a reason to slow down, share something, laugh, and remember. They are a small reminder that closeness is made through moments. A relationship is not built only through expensive gifts or dramatic gestures. It is built through attention: “I am here with you. This time together matters.”
I did not create them because my life was easy. I created them because I know how quickly an ordinary future can disappear. I know what it means to look backward and wish you could hold a moment again. I know that objects sometimes become connected to memories: a photograph, a letter, a song, or a simple gift that brings a person and a feeling back to mind.
For me, Cuddle Spoons represent something I still believe, even when faith feels faint: people need each other. We need affection, laughter, recognition, and shared experiences. We need reminders not to wait until it is too late to say, “You matter to me.”
Creating something after becoming disabled also gave me a way to say that I am still here. My hands and body may have limitations, but my ideas did not disappear. My desire to contribute did not disappear. My story did not end in 1988. It changed direction.
Disabled Does Not Mean Finished
Society often treats disability as an ending. It focuses on what a person can no longer do and fails to ask what that person still thinks, feels, imagines, and contributes. But being disabled does not mean being finished.
I am still capable of ideas. I am still capable of caring about other people. I am still capable of wanting to build something meaningful. I am still capable of being hurt, being proud, being disappointed, and trying again. None of those truths requires me to pretend that disability is a gift or that every struggle has made me grateful.
There is pressure on disabled people to turn pain into inspiration. We are often expected to be positive so other people can feel comfortable. But I believe a truthful life is more meaningful than a polished story. My disability has taken things from me. It has made many parts of life harder. It has tested my confidence and, at times, my faith. Saying that does not mean I have surrendered. It means I refuse to erase the cost of what I survived.
Strength is not always smiling. Sometimes strength is admitting that you are tired. Sometimes it is asking for help. Sometimes it is grieving again, even decades later. Sometimes it is working on an idea when no one seems to notice. Sometimes it is waking up to another difficult day and deciding that your life still deserves your effort.
I may never get back the exact life I had at 26. That is one of the hardest truths I have had to face. But the person I was is still part of me, and the person I became deserves to be seen too.
What I Wish People Understood
If you love or know someone with a disability, do not assume you understand their life because you can see their physical condition. Ask. Listen. Let them speak without rushing to correct their feelings or cover their pain with a positive phrase.
Do not tell them everything happens for a reason unless they invite that conversation. Do not measure their worth by productivity, independence, marriage, income, or physical ability. Do not disappear because their situation makes you uncomfortable. Your presence may matter more than your advice.
Include them before deciding something will be too difficult. Speak directly to them. Make plans that account for accessibility without making them feel like a burden. Remember that a wheelchair is a tool for mobility, not a definition of the person using it.
And please understand that grief does not follow a calendar. A person can adapt to disability and still grieve years later. They can be thankful for today and miss yesterday. They can enjoy a good moment while carrying sadness. Those feelings are not contradictions. They are part of being human.
Most of all, help create new memories. Call. Visit. Share a meal. Take a photograph. Tell a story. Laugh together. The goal is not to erase the past. It is to add something warm to the present.
Faith May Fade, but Love Leaves Evidence
Today, I do not pretend to have every answer. I still carry questions about why my life changed, why certain people left, and why some hopes never became reality. There are days when faith feels close and days when it feels far away.
But memories remain. They are evidence that I have loved, been loved, tried, created, failed, survived, and continued. They remind me that even a life marked by loss can leave something meaningful behind.
Perhaps faith does not always need to be a strong feeling. Perhaps, sometimes, it is simply the decision not to declare the story over. It is leaving a little space for another conversation, another idea, another laugh, another person, or another memory that has not happened yet.
I want my life to mean more than the stroke that changed it. I want people to know that behind the wheelchair is a man who had a past, still has a heart, and continues to imagine a future. I want the things I create to encourage people to hold one another closer and appreciate the ordinary time they share.
If people remember me by saying, “Even though Ken was dealt a bad hand in life, I wish that I had met him,” then I would consider my life well lived.
Faith may fade when life asks too much of us for too long. But memories do not fade so easily. They remain in the sound of a voice we miss, the shape of a hand we once held, the laughter around a table, and the objects that carry a story forward. They remind us that we were here—and that the moments we create today may one day become the most valuable things we own.
So make the call. Share the dessert. Say “I love you.” Take the picture. Forgive when you can. Sit together a little longer. Do not wait for a perfect day, because life has never promised us one.
Create the memory now.