Abstract
This study aimed to clarify the bodily experiences and their meanings of patients who have had a stroke complicating unilateral limb weakness, through everyday nursing, focusing on the recovery process of the 6-week period from onset. This study took the philosophical stance of Heidegger's ontology and Merleau-Ponty's phenomenology as embodiment. This data was analyzed based on Benner's interpretive phenomenology. The results showed that patients had recovered through four stages: “stranger's body”, “awakening body”, “interacting body (with mind and external world)”, and “one's own body”. Of these stages, the “awakening body” started to develop within the “stranger's body” without surfacing, and which was recognized to create a bridge toward “interacting body”. It was interpreted that these stages had indicated “the release from the dissociation of mind and body” and that it meant that the body shut off from the world had obtained action and tools while unifying the past and present and had become open again to the world with intimacy on the way of making them habit.