Seth-n-Jode's Adventures

I feel like I am in a storm.  Winds buffeting me from all sides.  Hurricane force gales threatening to topple me. And yet I feel this calm, deep, sense of peace...sometimes.  I vision my roots going down to the center of the earth and that even though the sea is violently hurtling me 'round up top.  That it will settle.  The world will right itself around me.

And here's what I'll see!

We had a good visit to Mapleton rehab today.  They have an impressive facility.   We also had a good Family Care Conference.  Our social worker said it was the best agenda he's ever had.  Thanks to all of you who helped me edit it and who also attended the call. Sorry the conference phone reception was a bit spotty and some of you on the phone had trouble hearing.  Most importantly, we got a lot of questions answered.  Seth is moving up the scale in all directions. 

Orthopedically, they now have him where he can sit at 90 degrees.  So they have brought in a new chair which lets him be more comfortable.  He also gets a shower on Thursday.  Hooray!  He's pretty excited about that after being sponge bathed for the past three weeks.  They do worry about him using his left arm which is supposed to be immobile in order to heal.  Seth has been hanging it up on his trapeze bar.  He's such a monkey.  But Seth did agree that he would keep his sling on most of the time from now on.  We'll have to keep a watch on it as he really gets uncomfortable. 

Cognitively, huge improvements.  He's concentrating longer now.  He graduated past the problem solving cards.   Although the therapist sometimes says it takes her a second to get his humor.  For instance, after successfully showing him a series of "problems"; ie forks in toasters, smoke in a room and him correctly responding what the issue was and what to do about it, she showed him a picture of a little girl with a book of matches that had only three matches and she was trying to light one match.  She asked him what was wrong with this and he said "Clearly, the little girl doesn't have enough matches!"  and then the same wry Seth smile. 

Speech therapy says he trys to do things too fast and sometimes makes mistakes.  They complain mightily about his handwriting and asked if it was really that atrocious prior to the accident.  (It was.).   His handwriting has always been so pathetic that when he writes me love letters, I have to have him read them to me! I told them they can use my laptop if they want to have him do his work that way so they can read his responses.  This dog isn't learning new tricks when it comes to improving his handwriting!   Anyway, he had a word game today where he had two words and had to think of another word in the same genre.  i.e, dog, cat and then he had to come up with horse or cow or something like that.  He did well although he got tired half way through and had to rest.  One of the items was twelve, seven and he wrote down 84 so it looks like his math skills are coming 'round too.  I told Seth that he has the time to slow down and do all this work right while he's healing and he agreed with me.

He also got an incentive spirometer today (which helps him keep his lungs in shape) and he's been blowing an impressive amount of air into it.

The doctor said he is doing great.  Huge improvements day to day. 

The nutritionist says he's eating well and we can feel free to bring him things from home to eat (which we actually had already been doing).  Mom's been making up his raw food fruit smoothie each morning.  Judy's filling him up with watermellon.  He's got a stack of toffee someone dropped off that he munches on from time to time as well. 

Seth has his followup MRI on his head as well as an MRI on his left shoulder on Thursday.  He also has his orthopedic appointment back at Denver Health on Monday and that's when we'll know more about how much longer until he can bear weight.  And hopefully he'll be doing well enough orthopedically that we can start looking to move him into acute rehab and then on home.  And/Or we may decide that he needs surgery on his left shoulder and left knee.  My thoughts are that if he's laid up anyway, try and get the surgery's done if they are necessary.  Seth agreed with me on this approach but said only to go with the surgeries if they are necessary.  He said if he can rehab his way to health, he'd prefer that to more surgery.

True story - Seth was a little blue this morning. I gave him a pep talk and he cheered up.  But, I think he is starting to realize the magnitude of his injuries and the time its going to take to heal.  Our social worker said this is common.  The patient's family has been through heck and back and is amazed at the progress.  Yet the patient is just becoming aware and is going through the same feelings that the patient's family had near when the injury occurred.  That being said, Seth is a fighter.  He will fight this fight.  I think he just realized today that this is a match that goes the distance.  No knock outs on this deal.