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Tiffany Rubenkoenig, 42, has a few things on her 2022 calendar, including a hair appointment for highlights, a family trip to California, and a Garth Brooks concert at Arlington’s AT&T Stadium. A summer festival was mentioned.
On July 30, as Ruben Koenig, her husband, and their friends headed to a concert, the sounds of guitar chords, the soothing sound of a harmonica, and the rhythmic beat of drums blared out of their car’s speakers. Along the way, Tiffany began to feel lightheaded and dizzy. Her husband, Ryan, noticed that she was hunched over in her seat, her speech was slurred and her face was drooping. These were all clear signs of a stroke.
That night, instead of visiting Garth Brooks, Rubenkoenig ended up going to Texas Health Arlington Memorial Hospital.
Her summer plans were interrupted after she suffered two life-threatening strokes and cardiac arrest. Along her road to recovery, Ruben Koenig founded Sprinkling Love, a nonprofit organization aimed at creating a support system for other stroke and brain injury survivors.
How to join Sprinkling Love
- Sign up for community emails at the bottom of the homepage.
- A list of books, treatments, and support groups can be found on our resources page.
- Donations to the organization will be used to purchase cookies and small gifts for survivors, according to the organization’s donation page.
- For questions, suggestions, or ways to get involved, please contact Tiffany Rubenkoenig here.
Rubenkoenig was motivated by his Christian faith and started Sprinkling Love as a way to repay all the support he received from family and friends. Through her nonprofit organization, Rubenkoenig delivers homemade cookies with flowers and Bible verses to other stroke and brain injury survivors. Sprinkling Love also has a blog where the Fort Worth resident chronicles her healing journey and the stories of the people she has met along the way.
“It’s very hard to suffer a stroke or a brain injury, but I think it’s important to always show people that someone cares, that God cares, and that people care.” said Rubenkoenig.
According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, stroke is the fifth leading cause of death among women. In the United States, one in five women between the ages of 55 and 75 will suffer a stroke.
But experiencing cardiac arrest after a stroke like Ruben Koenig’s is rare, said Dr. Matthew Fiesta, an interventional neuroradiologist at the Texas Department of State Health Services Fort Worth. Ruben Koenig was flown by helicopter to Texas Health Harris Methodist Hospital in Fort Worth, where he was treated by Fiesta.
Fiesta, who is also co-medical director of the hospital’s stroke program, said that through various medical scans, Rubenkoenig had only one artery in the back of his head, instead of the normal two arteries in the back of his head that supply blood and oxygen to the brain. I discovered that there is no.
“Unfortunately, Mrs. Rubenkoenig somehow injured or cut open her only artery,” Fiesta said. “That caused a huge blockage and she had a massive stroke.”
Rubenkönig underwent treatment to heal the clogged artery and prevent future blockages. A few weeks later, Rubenkoenig returned home to his family. She had difficulty speaking, moving on her own, and seeing.
“Of course, when you hear the nature of the injury, you expect a lot of bad news and a lot of prognosis,” Fiesta said. “I was telling them (Rubenkoenig’s family) that she actually looked clinically worse than she looked on the MRI, but I’ve seen people recover from these injuries before. So I think giving them the help they needed really helped, and it also made them want to fight even more.”
Rubenkoenig then began a months-long process to rebuild his motor and cognitive abilities through rehabilitation. She receives vision therapy through Robin Milroy, an occupational therapist at Texas Health Fort Worth.
Through therapy, Ruben Koenig uses driving simulators and other exercises to rebuild hand-eye coordination, visual processing, and depth perception.
Now, Mr. Rubenkoenig is nearing the end of his rehabilitation journey, Mr. Milroy said.
“She’s back to doing all the other things in life that a lot of people take for granted. She’s talking, she’s getting dressed, she’s bathing, she’s doing all of those things. She drives a car and she has her own organization,” Milroy said.
Since suffering a stroke, Ruben Koenig has felt driven by his faith in building a support network of resources and people through sprinkling love and his church. In May, she shared her story at Christ Chapel’s Biblical Counseling Ministry called Soul Care.
“I don’t know why I got this second chance at life, but because of it I feel like I have a responsibility to share it with others,” Rubenkoenig said. “One of the great things about faith is that it never lets you down. The world will let you down, but faith won’t let you down.”
Marissa Green is an American Legion member reporting on faith for The Fort Worth Report. Contact her at marissa.greene@fortworthreport.org or on X (previously known as her Twitter). @marissaygreene.
At The Fort Worth Report, news decisions are made independent of board members and financial supporters.Read more about our editorial independence policy here.
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