Lifting Up Dad From Our Knees.....: 03/14/07

Wednesday, March 14, 2007

afternoon adventure..

What a beautiful day it was! Andy, Jim's therapist, worked Jim hard yesterday. Connie, occupational therapy and Toni, speech therapy did, as well.

As I entered the room, Jim was resting on the mat. The energy he is expending to complete the simplest of task that you and I take for granted every day is enormous.

I have gone back to work in the mornings and look forward to rushing to the hospital each afternoon to see the latest progress. Yesterday, Andy had a surprise for Jim. It had been 55 days since Jim had been outside of the hospital walls. I had asked, and been given permission, to take him out into the fresh air.

As Andy got Jim back on his feet to complete the final stage of his therapy for the day, I could hear groans coming from his newly capped trach. This, also, was a new milestone. Capping the trach means Jim is breathing completely on his own. It also allows, with the help of a passover device, him to talk if he can. Speech therapy has worked diligently on getting him to form a word. As I sat and watched Andy get him in position for the parallel bars, I suddenly heard a familiar voice saying, "Oh, boy." I turned to look at my sons, Andy and Joe and new instantly, they heard it too. Praise God! All of the therapy staff responded. Yeah! It is the beginning of, hopefully, more to come.

With Andy encouraging Jim to complete his work, with the promise of a surprise adventure to come, Jim painstakingly walked the few necessary steps on the bars, then stepped up one step on the stairs.

Work completed, and back in his wheelchair, we headed for the elevator and down to the main floor of the hospital. I could tell from Jim's expression he realized something was different. When we reached the main door and wheeled him through it, the biggest smile came to his face!
God gave us a beautiful sunny, warm day to enjoy. We walked to the court yard and sat, just enjoying being alive. Of course I can't speak for my husband(nor would he want me to) but I believe with all my heart, he was thankful for the moment and breath!

Thank you Lord.

Sue

The story as we know it...

On Friday morning (Jan. 19th) around 10:50am, i recieved a call from my brother Joe telling me that he needed me at the house. I asked him what for and he told me that dad had hurt himself somehow...he had a black eye, his nose was bleeding and was "a little beat up". I immediatly got into my car and started heading that way. I called Joe back and asked him for more details and he told me that he was having a hard time getting dad up. I told him to call the EMS and he said that he thought Jason had already done that and he was on his way. When i pulled up, i saw the EMS was already there. I walked in and i saw Jason, Anna, Joe and several EMS people along with dad sitting on a gurney. They imediately took dad out in the EMS...not knowing what was wrong...just that something really wasnt right. We followed the EMS to parkview ER and had to go wait. Mom met us there as she flew across town to get there. We had to wait a long time (it seemed like days!) before we were told what was going on. The chaplain kept coming out to "brief"us...but thats all it was, a "brief". Finally, the ER doctor called the family together and told us the news...dad has a broken neck and he is bleeding in and on his brain on both sides....this is very serious. "Its a bad deal" the ER doc kept on saying, but we had to wait until the surgeon would come in and take a look at the CT scan before we could find out for certian what was wrong. Dr. Young finally came in and said that he had looked at dad and his scan. Dr. Young was very "matter of fact" with us which was good. We needed that! He told us very similar things to what the ER doctor told us. He said that dad had broke his neck, C2 to be exact. He also said that he was bleeding in several areas in his brain. He needed brain surgury immediatly. On a scale of one to ten...with ten being the worst...dad was a "plus 10". Dad went into surgury and was there for 3.5 hours or so...he came out of surgury fine but we found out the damage was worse than they had thought. They had to remove some of the damaged area and he would be on life support. We were told that the next 3-10 days are life and death...or very critical. What we think what happend is something as follows: Dad was sleeping down in the basement which is a normal thing. Between 8:30am and 10:30am, he tried going upstairs. This info is a little sketchy because we werent there, but based on some of the info that we have seen, we think that he tripped on the stair going up and fell...hitting his right eye on the stereo and then hitting face first on the ground. This created the damage that we are aware of. We spoke with the cardiologist today and found out that dad has also had a heart attack with in the last eight days, but they have not figured out exactly when. There is a thought that this might have caused the fall be we are uncertain. Dad is in stable but "second to second" condition. If and when dad comes out of the "coma" state, there will likely be many months of therapy that needs to be done, plus until the brain issues are resolved, they can not even think about looking at his broken neck. To sum it all up...dad is in very bad condition. We thank you all for all of your prayers and support and all of the food and gifts. Your love for my dad and our family is amazing and we are extremely grateful. We will continue to update you as we know more. Please continue to pray!! Pray for dad (jim) for healing. Pray for mom (sue) that she can continue to be strong. We do know that we most likely havent seen the worst yet. This is when we need your prayers the most. Please feel free to enter your thoughts on this blogspot as we will update you as we know more. We are very thankful for the love you all have shown.

Lifting Up Dad From Our Knees.....

Wednesday, March 14, 2007

afternoon adventure..

Dad with Alena at Christmas

The story as we know it...

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