Seth-n-Jode's Adventures

Truly, the halls of Kindred were alive today with the sound of music.  Our dear friends Colleen and William from Buena Vista had arranged for a friend of their's Camilla who is a professional cellist to come in and do a personal concert for Seth.  The music was breathtaking.  Seth was sitting on the side of his bed and we just held each other taking in each note like an eddy in a continuous rapid, like rainbows on a stormy sky, like being in a log cabin with a ferocious storm outside.  It was like an escape from this place to absolute beauty.  I can't thank you enough Colleen and William for setting this up and to Camilla for playing for us.  It was an experience we will forever cherish in our hearts.

Back in reality, the news is not good.  Our social worker came in to tell us that Dr. Cilo talked to the insurance company and they agreed that Seth should wait until he is weight bearing for acute rehab.  We have a meeting with Dr. Cilo tomorrow to get the exact details so I will reserve judgement on if I think he is advocating for us or not until I meet with him personally to hear what he has to say.  That being said, Seth and I prepared a list of talking points as to why we think he should be transferred to Craig and I will be sharing that with Dr. Cilo tomorrow in the hopes that I can convince him to advocate on our behalf and not let the insurance company determine Seth's fate.

Seth continues to get better.  I am now constantly going over details on decisions I'm making back on the home front and making sure he agrees with what I'm doing.  He comes up with such thoughtful suggestions just like he always has.  Plus he says he really likes the mental engagement.  He told me he feels like he is "drifting" where we are now and wants to do more things both physically and mentally.  He wrote his first email today.  It took him some time because that left hand isn't cooperating but he got it out!  He definitely needs some work to get back to how he used to type! Seth is reading constantly as well as doing excercises with his hands and legs as his therapists have shown him.  In fact, he is sleeping with his excercise bar tonight so that when Dr. Cilo walks in tomorrow, he'll quickly sit up (if he's not already up) and start doing chest ups with the bar!

I know you will all be interested in the outcome of this meeting.  I do hope it goes in our favor and that Dr. Cilo will call back the insurance company to say that Seth should indeed move.  If not, I will follow through with my appeal plan as per my previous post and let you know who you can write or email in order to help appeal on Seth's behalf.

Right now, I have to take this hour by hour.  And one day at a time.  If I think about going home (which is like the top of Everest (29,000 feet) and we're only at 5,000 feet), I can barely breathe.  So I don't let my mind go there too much.  When I start thinking of home, I'll instead think of where the music took me today or where the wildflowers bloom like this picture of us in Alaska Basin last year.

If any of you have seen the movie, Sicko, by Michael Moore, what happened in that movie happened to us today.  Our social worker came in to inform us that some nameless, faceless medical administrator with our insurance company, who has never even seen Seth and knows nothing about The Plan, had made a determination that Seth was not ready yet for acute rehab and should stay at Kindred until he is weight bearing (at least three more weeks).  This even though his neurologist, medical doctor and the admissions people at Craig Rehab have all determined that he is absolutely eligible for Craig Rehab.  I would say based on his progress, Seth should have already been there starting his acute rehabilitation a week ago.  I was simply speechless.  He was supposed to move to Craig Rehab tomorrow.  Our social worker told us that Dr. Silo (one of Seth's neurologists who works on a rotating basis evaluating patients at all the various hospitals) would be calling this insurance person to advocate that Seth is indeed ready.  Although I have never met Dr. Silo, he holds a very precious package in his hands.  I really hope that he advocates to get Seth to Craig Rehab this week.  Shouldn't Seth's doctors ultimately be the final arbiter on what care he needs not the insurance company?  I feel like this is a nightmare.

If Seth's neurologist is not successful in advocating for him, I may ask for you all's help in helping me advocate for Seth.  I will go to every level of Blue Cross.  I will call my senators and congressman.  I will get with whomever regulates the insurance industry to file a grievance.  I will absolutely do everything I can to NOT let this happen.  Hopefully, it doesn't come to this and Dr. Silo can convince the insurance person that Seth needs to be in acute rehab at Craig this week as his doctors had planned.

I'm sorry that I don't have better news to report.  Seth and I along with my mom and Judy (Seth's mom) were obviously very disappointed with this development.  At the same time, we have become very determined as we continue our way through this playing field to ensure we get the appropriate and best care so that Seth gets better.

Just like the determination that Seth has on his face for today's picture of him kayaking on the Upper Animas near our home in Durango!

Mom and I arrived early today for Seth's orthopedic appointment.  The ambulance drivers arrived and Seth immediately started joshing with them.  He really likes ambulance drivers although I do hope he doesn't make this a habit!

The orthopedic appointment went pretty well.  They said that Seth's bones are knitting together properly and they took out all the sutures and staples.  Although they did say that he is having some extra bone growth on his right femur.  They say this is very normal in patients that have had head injury along with broken bones and the docs don't understand why the body does this.  Its almost as if the body overcompensates and tries to heal the bone with extra bone growth.  They aren't too worried about it just yet.  They just said that they would be watching it and it might require a small surgery if it were continue to grow and get too big and then they would just have to scrape it off.   They said they did not know if the left knee will eventually require surgery.  But they said in any event, it is not something they would do now.  They need Seth's other injuries to heal first and a surgery to repair his PCL tear on his left knee would be way down the road and it would depend on if it is something that is inhibiiting Seth from doing his everyday life.  I also asked if they were going to put a CPM machine (which would move Seth's right leg slowly) but the doctor said it wouldn't do any good since the injuries on the right leg are bone and not tendon related. 

As you know Seth's left shoulder was severely dislocated.  It looks like he suffered some nerve damage from this as his left pinky and ring finger are numb but the doctor did some evaluation of what Seth can do now and was encouraged at what he can do.  So he said this injury would probably just take time for the nerves to heal.  Unfortunately, the shoulder MRI did not make it with Seth to the appointment but Kindred is sending that over today so that the doctor can look at it to see if it tells us any more information.

The best thing of all that came out of the meeting is that Seth doesn't have to keep the bolster between his legs anymore NOR does he have to wear the sling!  Both of which were objects that he didn't like at all. Hooray!  They said that he can put his left hand up on the trapeze or use his left arm minimally to be able to move himself around.  They just don't want him using the left arm to bear most of the weight for fear of dislocating it again.  The doctor said that he can start squeezing balls with his left hand and said that the rehab is mostly "use it or lose it" right now with regard to the left hand.  Seth has been massaging his left hand constantly and was squeezing a ball so the doctor said that is the right track to get feeling back in those fingers as the nerve heals.

The doc said that Seth should be able to bear weight in three weeks on his right leg.  And he should be able to bear weight in 7 - 9 weeks on his left leg.  He can't bend more than 90 degrees at his hips or move his left leg across his right leg for 3 more weeks either. Its been three weeks since Seth's surgeries. And then of course, it takes time to recover to be able to walk again since he hasn't been walking for three months. 

They scheduled an appointment on July 29th for him to meet with Dr. Mann who is a sports medicine doctor.  We also scheduled an appointment on August 14th for a followup with Dr. Smith who is the orthopedic doctor we met with today.

Enough about the nitty gritty detail.  I want to share some personal info mostly to get it off my chest.  I have been having a fair bit of internal guilt over the fact that when I found Seth one month ago in the middle of the road barely breathing, I didn't do anything constructive besides panic and scream.  I was too afraid to try to roll him over for fear of further hurting him.  I simply did not know what to do.  I was alone except for the driver of the car who hit him who wasn't helping at all.  I didn't have a phone. Luckily, angels were nearby that heard my screams and within a few minutes of the accident had Seth stablized, talking and responding.  But there are times when I let my mind go to places that are just to scary to dwell.  Where I think of the what ifs or if no angels had been on hand. 

I have told Seth that we are going to ride this one together. He's going to help me when I'm down and I'm going to help him when he's down.  I broke down today in front of him and shared my feelings with him about how guilty I feel for not helping him when he most needed my help.  He stroked my back and said its all going to be ok.  I feel terrible about breaking down in front of him especially when he is so hurt but we've both agreed that in order to get through this thing, we are going to have to be brutally honest with where we both are at any point in time.  

Just like today, he was talking with a good friend of ours, Brendan, who does some contractor work for us up in Pagosa Springs.  Brendan has basically stepped in and taken the reins of a property we own up there and figured out some major contracting issues that Seth had been working on prior to the accident.  Another angel watching over us, really.  Seth got tears in his eyes as he was talking with Brendan.  I have never seen Seth cry in the 20 years I've known him.  Never.  And yet, when I asked him why he was crying, he said it was because there are just so many good people in the world who are helping us.  It scares me to see this mountain of a man cry because he is this sun around which I orbit. But how I have to think about it is how we will both grow stronger for it and that its ok for him to cry too for joy or fear or angst or the unknown.  Its ok and my sun is still there and now theres just a few drops of rain about me.

Anyway, I want to end the blog this evening with a kind of funny story.  Linda and Keith who are neighbors of ours in Durango basically threw me a rope and pulled me out of the recirculating eddy I have been in this past month to get me to go to Hot Yoga.  So I went to a 90 minute Hot Yoga class on Sunday morning.  Now I've been doing Hot Yoga for about 3 years but I'm definitely on the short bus when it comes to doing proper yoga poses.  I'm all bound up and basically can barely touch my toes most days.  I guess the only thing I've got going for me is that I try!  My goal in my Hot Yoga classes in Durango has been to have my teacher say "Beautiful pose, Jody" and really mean it for the fact that I'm doing a beautiful pose.  But no luck so far!  Anyway, after my Hot Yoga class this past Sunday in Boulder, the teacher comes up to me and sure enough asks if this is my first hot yoga class!  I tried to answer in such a way that she didn't feel like she had to pull her foot out of her mouth.  But we basically agreed that this class was Bikram and it wasn't like the Vinyasa yoga I had been doing and thus why I still look like I'm learning!

I still consider myself Yogini of the Mountain.  No matter how good or bad my poses are!  The picture for today is Seth, Kelly and John doing yoga up above Namche Bazaar in Nepal.  A pretty awesome setting for yoga if I do say so myself.  The only problem....no air....

Happy 43rd Birthday Seth!  Wow, what a day.  We had probably 30 visitors show up for the party throughout the evening!  It was really great and Seth loved seeing everyone.  Plus he got lots of calls and emails from the folks from out of town or who couldn't come.

We bought him two ice cream cakes and they got mostly eaten up.

Here's a picture that Ingrid took of him.  He is just so vibrant.  Talking with everyone.  Joking, laughing.  It was really a great birthday.

He's now swinging his legs over and sitting on the edge of the bed as long is someone is there to gently place his legs down and stand with their feet stopping his feet from sliding.  He really likes that as he gets the weight off his back.

Anyway, short blog tonight as we are heading to the hospital early tomorrow to go with him to his orthopedic appointment at 7:30 a.m.  We'll ride in the ambulance with him over to Denver Health for this appointment.  We have a list of questions prepared for the doctor and hope that his legs are healing properly and quickly.  We should know more about his weight bearing status tomorrow.

So now all he needs for Christmas is his two front teeth, right??  :)

We got pizza today!!!  Beau Jo's own canadian bacon and pineapple on a thick white crust, extra mozzeralla and honey to put on the crust.  Hmmmmmmmmmmmmmm  Gooooooodddd!  Thanks Karl for bringing it.  All of us chowed down and it was probably the best pizza I've ever tasted!

More good news.  Seth got his catheter out and all his piece parts down in that region are doing their jobs properly.  So no more tubes!  Hooray.  Lets celebrate...which we plan to do at his birthday party tomorrow! Join us if you can at Kindred, 1920 High Street between 5:00 p.m. to 7:00 p.m. to share in some ice cream cake!  Just the gift of your company is necessary if you can make it!

We did some more math problems with Seth.  He's having a little problem with subtraction but coming along.  There were many math questions that his mom Judy asked him where I was reaching for my HP and he would just answer them.  He's always been a math whiz and addition, multiplication and division seem to be working perfectly for him.  And for the most part subtraction is working ok but he still gets some wrong answers but now he's realizing he's wrong once he says the wrong answer.

Seth is also able to move both his legs now.  They are really starting to work on getting his range of motion back.  We've got to get that boy back onto his bike, into his kayak, on his telemark skis and into his hiking boots.  He certainly has his work cut out for him but he's starting to have me do extra PT on him because he says it hurts so good!

The picture for today shows our friend Missy enjoying the local delicacy in Peru which is Qui (basically guineau pig).  I ordered one too (thinking when in Rome do as the Romans do) but I simply couldn't eat it.  The food in South America is raw in the sense that I think the poor little pig was probably running around about 5 minutes before it ended up on my plate.  Missy had come to trek with us in Peru on the Inca Trail over to Machu Picchu. Anyway, we climbed up and over the Inca Trail for 5 days and ended up coming into Machu Picchu just as the sun was rising.  If you ever have a chance to visit that place, I highly recommend it.  It is simply stunning in a spiritual and majestical way.  I thought it would be this big tourist trap but it really took me by surprise.  To see the craftsmanship in how the stones were put together and are still standing since they were put there around 1450 or so took my breath away.  Anyway, as we came back down into Cusco, Missy came down with Montezuma's revenge.  I swear it must have been the Qui.  We just started calling her Barfo, Poopo, Hacko (BPH).  And then since she'd paid for a first class trip and I wanted to be sure she got her money's worth, we got ourselves in the back of a 2 ton dump truck and spent a day breathing diesel fumes as the truck rumbled its way into the Huayhuash range for some trekking.  Missy was only partially BPHing by the time we started the trek and she is always game for an adventure.  Anyway, we all ended up getting pretty sick throughout the rest of the trek.  But it was so worth it.  The mountains were simply beautiful.  We had a few little issues like losing the horses which were carrying all our gear. But we found them.  Minor little problems like this up at 16,000 feet!  At the end of the day, it all worked out.  The world righted itself around us. And if I remember right, when we got back to Cusco, (we first had a shower to wash off more grit and grime than I think I've ever accumulated before) and then we had pizza.  And boy did it taste good!