Gene's Blog

Dark night turned into a bright new day

I’ve not been here for a bit and while doing some housecleaning thought to check back in here and noticed my last post. I thought I’d best update things!

Evan spent a month in the Critical Care Unit of the ICU but last Thursday was moved to the “normal” ICU. He had us all very worried for much of the month and I’ve spent most of my non-working hours there with him. He was mostly comatose, kept that way, for three weeks. On the rare occasion his eyes would open, they were a blank, vacant stare. No sign of him at all. But last week, he suddenly began improving again.

They had begun weaning him off the respirator last weekend, until then he had been unable to sustain breathing on his own at all. I think the problem was, not only the severity of his asthma, but the smallness of the passenger seat compartment in the vehicle he was riding. He had severe bruising on both sides and I think his sides were hammered by the center console and the caving in of the passenger door multiple times during the accident, severely bruising his lungs. Once THEY healed, he was able to be weaned off the respirator, by the end of last weekend, he was breathing on his own entirely, and Monday night when I got there to visit him, the first thing I noticed was the room seemed empty – that was because the respirator had been removed. He was breathing entirely on his own, through the tracheotomy site, receiving slightly moistened air, but initiating breaths on his own. His improvement since then has been remarkable.

Friday evening when I arrived, they had installed an ingenious little device that allowed him to talk, on his own, hands still tethered, but when I came into the room, he looked at me and said, “hi, pop”. My son was back in his body, mind lucid, no memory of the accident but fully conscious and hardly able to believe he had missed a whole month. His wounds are healing well, he still has a lot of pain with the right leg and hip fracture and the left ankle is being kept going by another device, a wound vac, that is usually used with burn victims, which flushes the area 24/7 with fluids and nutrients. The sole of his foot was reattached with staples, which were removed this past week, as the reattachment “took” and there is healing going on there. It is still likely he will need a graft of some kind as he lost so much tissue, but he will keep his foot and a plastic surgeon will make it functional. He will be moving from the hospital to a care center in two to three weeks, where he will begin rehabilitation, to learn to walk all over again and regain the strength in his body. He has virtually none now, they removed the tethers from his wrists yesterday, but after over a month in one position, everything is sort of locked in one place and it is excruciating to move, even though vocational rehabilitation has already begun to help him regain range of motion and strength in his arms and shoulders. Anyone who had seen him bucking like a bronco as the medications would wear off over the past three weeks, trying to get out of bed, would find it hard to believe that he is now this week. Drugs are powerful fuel though and the enforced position has left him weak as a kitten. But the news is all good and he will again regain the strength of a lion, it will just take some time. And more time with him is what we have now, thanks to the angels of mercy, they call RN’s, who work 12 hour shifts with just two patients in the Critical Care Unit and whose professionalism, kindness, expertise and optimism kept our whole group of family and friends going these past four weeks. They are selfless and dedicated and marvelous human beings. And their ranks are being cut by 100 thanks to the skinflint we have as a Governor, Tim Pawlenty, Mr. No Taxes on the rich, who is preparing to end any sort of medical care for single adults, employed or not, able to care for themselves or not, so his rich friends aren’t inconvenienced in any way. For a party, Republican, that bills itself as Christian they seem to know little of how Christ treated the poor and infirm. That will be another post. This one I will end with a small prayer of gratitude to my Jenna and the angels who work with her for giving me back my only child. Thank you. Much love, :^) gene

If today brings even one choice your way
choose to be a bringer of the light :^) gene