Saturday, November 13, 2010

Your 24 hour fix

So sorry!  I know it is probably hard for those of you who this is your only source of information to go more than 24 hours with out the latest and the greatest.  Besides that, it is hard for me to decipher what I have shared and what I haven't.  The days are still, well, one big long day!

Lara is definitely making progress in the right direction.  Fever wasn't a problem today.  She did take a few more "steps" with the walker yesterday.  By steps I mean her right leg takes a very teeny step and she slides her left foot.  She moves about 4 inches at most with the help of a walker and three people.  But hey, 4 more inches than last week!  She has got to have her hair washed and almost a bath...well, if that's what you want to call it.  Or just a really wet sponge bath.

A big step is her swallow evaluation.  Passed it!  She is now eating food, but cut up pretty small, like you would a two year old.  The moment you have all been waiting for (drum roll) a daily dose of Lemon Lime Happiness!  (That will forever be it's name).  That being said the past two nights for dinner, when she could have something close to normal, she had fish...well, grey fish, over cooked rice and steamed veggies.  She ate the veggies and some rice.  Tonight she had meatloaf with a gravy on it, mashed potatoes and green beans.  I not only speak for myself, but for my older sister when I say...envision canned cat food.  Let's just say she didn't eat much tonight.

She did sit in a chair for a little while today.  Even almost stood herself completely up from the chair by herself.  We did her exercises and she seems to get better every day.  Like she now eats from the left side, but with her right hand.  Feeding herself!  She still struggles with turning her head to the left and seeing over there.  One of her gazillion (yes, that's the number) therapists wants us to interact on the left and make her use it more.  We will see with time if it is just a strength thing, or a blocked vision thing.  We are rooting for strength.  We can always get stronger.

Remember that ICU psychosis we've talked about.  When she is fresh off of a nap she seems to be the regular old Lara.  She makes her quick whit remarks, pumping eye brows, rolling eyes, Justin obsessed behavior.  When she is tired is when she struggles more with reality.  A lot of times she is staying in a hotel and we all have rooms.  Melvin's is down the hall this way and Mom's is that way.  She wants to go to Mom's room a lot.  To do things like shower or lay down when we are trying to get her to do things she doesn't want to do.  Today seemed to be a little better with that.  I'm not sure if it's because when she was resting she was full on sleeping, or if she is just getting better.  At one point during one of her breathing treatments for her pneumonia she took her mask off and said, "This is just dumb, let's just go."  Not really sure on that one.  I think a little of both reality and dream.

It being the weekend not a whole lot happens in terms of the doctor side.  She has been decreased on a good amount of dripped drugs.  Takes some by mouth and some not at all!  The drain for the pressure in her head has now been raised to 25.  They are saying we will know for sure by Tuesday if we can take it out, or shunt it.  I have even heard rumors of a new room by next weekend...shhh don't jinx it.

4 comments:

  1. Thank you so much for the update! I'm really grateful you're able to keep us posted! Lara's feisty, so I know she can pull through this! I'll keep sending positive thoughts her way!

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  2. She is doing great! We want to come visit soon, but Macy had a fever this past week. Hopefully when everyone is well we can come over to visit. I am feeling a bit helpless. Is there anything I can do?

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  3. I can sure understand her feelings with eating the "mystery food" that she is going to get periodically. I remember well the things Mom had as she progressed through her swallow test allowed things. Lara sure shows a lot of progress though from the very start with everything she is doing. Mostly I love her spunk.--Trena

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  4. Let Lara know that Bryce and Ambir are cheering her on and that she needs to get better so we can make our Indian lamb ribs for her.

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