There is no excuse.
If you want one, though, that picture is me on Sunday afternoon (from Dave's perspective, since I fell asleep in his lap) after finishing a retreat with my middle schoolers over the weekend. So that gives me a least a few days, right?
Really, I have thought about the blog many times in the past two weeks, but things have been insane. I'll do my best to recap:
First, no bone infection! The antibiotics that Dr. Archdeacon prescribed did the trick, and the redness around the incisions is gone. Not only that, Dave is back to walking even better than before the second surgery! Once he made it through the first two weeks, the pain subsided enormously, and even the annoying pain in his hip that he had learned to deal with is better. Dave is back down to his Fentanyl patch and an occasional Percoset, but no more Valium or Morphine. Overall, surgery was a rough experience, but he is, as promised, all the better for it. We even went for a 45 minute walk in the park yesterday, and Dave did great!
To further ensure that Dave's femur heals this time, he now has the privilege of wearing a contraption called a bone stimulator, which sends electromagnetic pulses through his leg to stimulate bone growth ten hours per day (actually, per night since he wears it while he sleeps). Although he has another follow-up with Dr. Archdeacon on April 20th, we probably won't know how well the bone is healing for at least another six months.
One of the reasons that Dave is walking so well, in addition to the surgery: we're back in PT/OT again! And I have to tell you that outpatient is nothing like inpatient or even in-home - Regina, Dave's new Physical Therapist, is not j0king around. Day 1, she had him lying flat on his back (did I mention he's been sleeping at a 30-degree angle since his accident because of his lungs and his cough?) doing exercises - he now sleeps flat every night WITHOUT COUGHING FITS! Day 2 was lots of standing. And Day 3, yesterday: Dave walked up AND down five or six steps alternating feet (left foot on one, right foot on the next step up, left foot on the next step up - the way you probably walk up steps) in both directions. It was incredible! She also had him balancing on a balancing board and walking on a treadmill, and even in the past three or four days, Dave is looking like a new person. The plan is for eight visits of PT over the next few weeks, then a "break" (for Regina, at least) while we work on endurance at home, then back to PT after the next surgery for a few more visits. Supposedly, Dave's insurance only covers 30 outpatient PT visits per year, so we are doing our best to use them wisely.
One small hiccup in the PT (sidenote: Dave has not actually had the hiccups since his accident - I know this because one of my middle school girls asked him in a Get Well card back in June and now continues to ask him every time she sees him...): the first time Dave went in for his eval, his heartrate and oxygen levels were jumping all over the place (heartrate from 60 to 130 with only mild exertion and in only a few seconds; oxygen from 94% to 85% - completely unhealthy - during the same activities). The problems may be simply as a result of Dave being severely out of shape (understandably), but the changes are enough to be worrisome. As a result, Dave now wears oxygen (back to the tubes) during exercise, including at home as soon as we get the prescription from Dr. Hardin, to keep his levels up. He also had an EKG on Friday and is currently wearing a Holter Monitor (a 24-hour EKG) to watch his heartrate and ensure that his activities are not putting any undue strain on his heart. We'll have the results from the EKG today and from the Holter sometime later this week. Be praying that everything is normal.
In the midst of all of that, we continue to enjoy our puppy, prepare for our Wedding Celebration on June 6, 2009, and live as much of a normal life as possible (went on our first official date since January to see Slumdog Millionaire on Monday - so good!). We are getting more sleep, getting out of the house almost every day, and GRADUALLY cutting down on the number of pills that we have to put in Dave's pill boxes every week (the multi-colored array was getting a little dizzying, both for me as I assembled it and for him as he took it).
I'm sure I've missed some huge pieces of our last two weeks, but hopefully, you feel at least slightly back in the loop. When I start getting messages from my dad's family from Montana asking if we are okay (which happened last night), I know it's been far too long since I updated the blog. To think positively, though, you know that you never want to go back to the days when daily - or even hourly - updates were necessary. The glass is always half full... :-)
Thanks for continuing to check in and walk alongside us (if only electronically) as each day we take more steps toward ending this blog forever. :-)
Love and prayers from all of us...
