Yeah, what you said. My dad had a stroke, and I think his depression from his diminished faculties ended up being a bigger deal. I don’t have any sense that ABC forced him onto the air - quite the opposite… he probably needed this goal in mind every day to push himself through therapy. After all these years, I’m sure if he told ABC that he wanted to be back on the air NYE, they would undoubtedly oblige him.
I wasn’t shocked, I realized he had a stroke and figured he might have speech problems. I was more surprised that he was doing so well. Had no problem with it, thought it was great he was there in any capacity or condition. He lost no dignity in my eyes.
In retrospect, I’m glad Dick Clark got to come back on his own terms. Last night, however, my New Year’s excitement was a bit dampened by his rough condition. As he finished stumbling over the countdown, I had to snap myself back into celebration mode, because I was overcome by a feeling of sorrow for the guy.
Of course, it didn’t help that I told my friends to put it on ABC specifically so I could see how he was holding up.
Poor guy. He doesn’t sound too good. I recorded the ball-drop segment (went to sleep before midnight), and he was saying stuff and slurring his speech. He was also a little early on his countdown- the ball didn’t reach the bottom until after he finished saying “One…happy 2006.”
So, is there an online link where I can here him?
thanks,
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I didn’t see it. ( Went to sleep at 10pm) but I am ashamed for all the people who think Dick Clark should have stayed home. Have any of you been around someone severly disabled or recovering from illness? Y’know, they don’t look perfect, they are not at the top of their game and …guess what…sometimes…due to severe limitations…they smell. If you are all like this with an Icon like Dick, I really hate to see how you are with someone you know who suffers a horrid illness…oh wait…you.avoid.them.
The man recovering from something as debilitating as a stroke has fought back to a functioning level. Do you know how many old people just give up and give in?
I am extremely proud of him.
Where in the hell is your compassion?
Cause, y’know all you and me see on TV is young, beautiful botox’d people.
Lest anyone else accuse me of having a lack of compassion for people who have suffered a stroke or other debilitating illness, my the context of my comment concerned his personal comfort level. I do not think for a second that people who are ill should be locked up at home or shielded from the public eye. Dick, despite how much recovery he has been able to achieve, seemed to be having a rough time out there. I applaud his courage in coming back on the television for NYE, and for his struggle to come back as far as he has. It just didn’t look to me like he was having a very good time.
Does anyone know what side of the brain Dick Clark’s stroke affected? Just from watching the NYE footage, I would guess he had a left sided stroke (since his right side seems paralyzed). If he did have a left sided stroke, that is the side of the brain that stores language and memory. So, look at him as if he was someone who had to learn the English language AND how to speak!
Where is your common sense? I’m real sorry, but a big-time, live television broadcast is PRECISELY the place where you HAVE to be at the top of your game. Your contention that people are heartless simply because they aren’t excited about sitting through a television show whose host can barely spit his words out (and slurs them when he does) is nonsense.
If it were an unknown, you’d have a point. However, he has been hosting for how long? People want to see him host. They weren’t expecting him to be flashy and perfect. They just wanted him.
I understood everything he said.
Was there a poll? Did somebody actually ask, “Would you like to have an obviously impaired Dick Clark host again?”
How bad does he have to be before everyone finally acknowledges that all good things must come to an end?
If there were a poll, I think everyone would say “Yes, if he wants to.”
I give him a 10 for a superb effort at a comeback. Cut the guy some slack, for cryin’ out loud it’s barely been a year since his stroke. That’s some amazing progress. And it’s not like he’s peaked. With continued therapy he’ll get better.
I think Kirk Douglas had a stroke and his speech was hammered hard at first.
Someone can correct me if I’m wrong but I thought I saw a semi-recent clip of him and I swore he had fully recovered.
Go Dick Go!
Dick Clark without his voice is not “him.” It’s not just a little slurring, the entire timbre of his voice has changed. He no longer sounds anything like Dick Clark – a fact of which I’m sure the man himself is painfully aware. I grew up spending almost every NYE with him, too, but to pretend otherwise is to ignore reality for the sake of sentimentality.
I remember Dick Clark back to his 1950’s American Bandstand days, long before he started hosting New Year’s Eve on ABC. Yes, he always seemed to be the eternal teenager. It was sad to see him in that condition on New Year’s Eve but as others have said, he made a good effort.
A bit of trivia - Dick Clark was revealed to be the murderer in the very last Perry Mason episode. (This does not include those 2 hour “Return of Perry Mason” TV movies).
Misnomer, my voice was slurred and robotic for a year after my stroke and I can assure you that I was still myself. Because of people like you, who could not see the person behind the struggling voice, I simply stopped talking. It was easier than crying every night.
Maybe people’s attitudes regarding Dick Clark are based upon ignorance. There is no 100% recovery from a stroke. Brain matter does not heal like skin. If it’s damaged, it’s gone. You have to make do with what’s left. Age makes the recovery process much harder as well. Also, as I pointed out above, if he had a left sided stroke he will have a long, hard recovery process. I had my stroke when I ws 24 and I am missing parts of my parietal, frontal, and temporal lobes. I look and talk normal but put me in any scan, you’d see the holes in my brain. This is the last time I will post in this topic because I find the opinions and ignorance here disheartening.
Wow, the lengths some people will go to in order to wrap themselves in righteousness and huff at the rest of us! Yes, American Maid, I’m talking to you!
Are you really going to stand up there on your soapbox and pretend that you didn’t know what I meant by “he is his voice?” His voice is what made him. His voice is what identifies him. His voice is his paycheck. His voice was a solid chunk of his entire life for more than 50 years. Seeing him but hearing someone else’s voice come out of his mouth made my heart BREAK. Maybe those of you suffering from those sharp intakes of breath simply can’t understand, but anyone who has ever made a living with their body (especially their voice) was crying inside for Dick Clark on Saturday. In sympathy, not derision! Do you really think that because I mourn the loss of what made Dick Clark Dick Clark it also means that I kick stroke victims in my spare time? Seriously, WTF??
If a famous guitar player lost a hand in an accident and during his next public appearance could barely pick out the tune to “Mary Had a Little Lamb,” and a bunch of people expressed their sadness about what the musician had lost, we’d no doubt have a flood of one-handed Dopers posting (albeit slowly, with just the one hand and all) to call us names and then running off in a huff! I feel like insulting fat, minivan-driving, cat-loving people just because it couldn’t get any more ridiculous around here!
When people talk about the board going downhill, this is exactly the type of thread I think of.
I guess I’m weird, but I actually found it anything but depressing seeing him. It was as if he was saying “Fuck you, stroke!” and getting on with it. Obviously it was sad seeing him unlike his old glib self, just as it’s sad seeing Maureen O’Hara look like this (don’t worry, she doesn’t look awful, she just looks 85) rather than like this but clearly he has his wits about him (I think the worst thing about having a stroke would have to be having lucid thoughts that you can’t express) and is wanting to get back in the game, if only to stick his little toe in. We’re all going to have strokes one day (or heart attacks, or cancer, or whatever) if we live long enough, and this lets you know that if it’s not the end of you then it doesn’t have to be the end of you. It was wonderful to see Dick again on New Years Eve (uh, I mean… traditions are good.)
My brother-in-law had a stroke 2 years ago. (He was in his 40s, never smoked a cigarette or had a wildly out of control cholesterol/BP or anything that might indicate he was likely to have one so young.) His voice still isn’t quite right, but he’s totally “back” on the inside and he has full use of himself again. I love that he’s gotten over self consciousness about his voice and goes out in public and enjoys everything he once did (except for flying, which he’s leary to try again).
That said, I couldn’t believe how heated the topic was on SIRIUS Talk Radio today. A couple of talk show hosts (not shock jocks) made “He really shouldn’t go on TV like that” comments and I mean the phone lines were jammed with people cursing them out or cursing the cursers. One caller actually said that he doesn’t like seeing people like Dick and Muhammad Ali on TV because “it reminds me that that’s gonna happen to me one day”. I take a more Norman Thayer like approach (when Ethel tells him “this is the first time I ever thought you were gonna die one day”): “I knew it all along.”
Sampiro (who growing up surrounded by people born in the 19th century was witness to more stroking than the towel boy at a Turkish bath.)