By: Marci Narum
People who struggle with mental illnesses have been putting their faith in Tonya Auck for more than a decade. This psychiatric mental health nurse practitioner did inpatient work in a hospital setting for 10 years treating severe mental illness – schizophrenia, bipolar suicide, addiction –through traditional medication management.
Now, she is adding faith to her own private practice, Enlighten Health Care in Bismarck, North Dakota.
“During that time, I was feeling burned out,” Tonya shares. “But my faith was getting stronger, and I felt God was pushing me to do something different. I wanted to branch out and start praying with people and discovering faith with people. That’s why I’m here in this office.
“I'll do meds and supportive therapy along with that and prayer and scripture and how do we get through these things based on what the Bible says,” Tonya adds. “Even though your brain is playing tricks on you, you can pray about it. It’s a good tool to have,” Tonya explains.
Tonya knows how the body can play tricks – and how having a strong faith helped in her own healing journey. Shortly after she started seeing patients in December 2022, Tonya had a stroke. She was 40 years old.
“I stood up and was dizzy and weak on my left side and I couldn’t really walk or move,” Tonya explains. “I could feel everything on the left side of my body, but it wouldn’t work, it felt heavy, and nothing would move, and the left side of my face got droopy.”
It was New Years Day, and Tonya was spending the holiday with her parents and children in Lakota, North Dakota.
“We had hockey games in Devils Lake, so that’s why I was there. We were supposed to drive that morning, but the game got canceled. I was really lucky,” Tonya says, “or I would have been driving with my kids when the stroke happened. God works in funny ways.
“I figured it was a brain aneurysm or a stroke,” Tonya shares. “Being a nurse, I knew the symptoms. They took me to Grand Forks to get a clot buster to help prevent further damage from the stroke and to help alleviate the symptoms right away. But then I became fully paralyzed.”
Tonya underwent surgery after her doctors discovered what had caused the stroke.
“They found a hole in my heart,” Tonya says. “It was probably bound to happen, just a matter of when.”
The medical term for the hole in Tonya’s heart is Patent Foramen Ovale (PFO). Her doctors said she’d had it her whole life but didn’t know until the stroke. According to the Mayo Clinic website, this hole exists in everyone before birth, but most often closes shortly after being born.
“My doctor told me that one in four people have (a PFO), but only 2% of those people have strokes. The more I talk about this the more I hear that it’s so common in young people that have strokes, and I’ve advocated for people who’ve had the same symptoms; you need to ask your cardiologist to check for this.”
“They say if you have a hole in your heart, the tissue around it gets bumpy … and that can throw a clot. I had an aneurysm on the outside of the hole in my heart and that probably developed the clot, which ended up going up to my brain versus my body dissolving it.
“It’s an easy procedure. They just put a mesh lining in the hole, and it grows and closes it.”
Tonya is otherwise extremely healthy. She says her cholesterol is good, she does not smoke, and she works out at the gym most days.
“I take care of myself, and I still had a stroke. If I hadn’t been working out and being as physically active as I was, I probably wouldn’t have recovered as fast.
“You just never know when you’re going to throw a clot, and it goes the wrong way and goes up to your brain.”
Tonya credits her healthy lifestyle, but especially her strong faith for getting her through the ordeal. She believes it’s why she experienced a profound recovery. Completely paralyzed the day of the stroke, she was able to walk the following day.
“The therapist said, ‘I’ve never seen anyone walk the next day.’ I thought that was a good sign. I just tried to have faith. I listen to scripture every day. That’s what got me through my whole hospital stay. Just keeping up my faith.”
Still, the road to recovery was a long one for Tonya, starting with two weeks in physical rehabilitation in Fargo.
“They told me you’re going to leave here with a walker or a cane, and I said, ‘No, no I’m not.’
And I didn’t. They cleared me and I didn’t leave with any of that.”
Tonya continued to do physical therapy, brain therapy, and cognitive speech therapy for four months before returning to work.
“I needed therapy to make sure my mind was working because I prescribe medications. After a stroke most people can have brain fog, tiredness, dementia-like symptoms. I knew that wasn’t me, but I had to do the therapy.
Despite the lingering effects of the stroke, Tonya is back in her private practice helping her patients.
“I still have deficits. I'm not 100%. My leg drags, and I have spasms.”
In keeping with her plans to help patients beyond prescribing medication, Tonya plans to get a certificate in Christian Counseling and Naturopathy.
“You set your goals and have faith and pray on it, you can do what you set your mind to.”
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