A 21-year-old Nova Scotia man is expected to graduate from college exactly three years after suffering a series of strokes from which doctors thought he might never recover.
Joe Miller woke up on June 11, 2012 with a headache and headed to a doctor’s office, where he collapsed on the floor. He was admitted to hospital and it was determined he had experienced four strokes caused by bacterial meningitis.
The strokes caused damage that required Miller to re-learn how to do everyday tasks, including driving, but he managed to finish high school and enrolled in a welding program at Nova Scotia Community College in Stellarton.
Miller is expected to walk across the convocation stage in on June 11 -- three years to the day he was hospitalized.
College wasn’t without challenges, including short-term memory loss.
“The hardest part was trying to do the math,” Miller says, “trying to remember like all the formulas and stuff.”
But Miller was dedicated to learning, says his welding instructor Darrell Linthorne.
“I do know a lot of people that had serious illnesses such as Joe's and to date they're still not able to do what he's accomplished,” he says.
“He has the attitude,” Linthorne adds. “That's what’s required for this job.”
Miller, meanwhile, says he’s proud of how far he’s come, but that luck was also part of his success.
“Someone’s watching out for me.”
With a report from CTV Atlantic’s Kayla Hounsell
