¿Que Paso?

Hello all—

Yesterday was probably Kari’s most successful day at Craig yet.  Although she still had a lot of shoulder pain, she was able to wean for 7hrs and 20min and was also in her wheelchair for over 6 hrs.  This was both her longest wean and the longest she has ever been able to stay up.  It seems that she’s really turned the corner with her stomach pain and infections too.  Her secretions are less, and she only needed suctioning about every hour, down from about every 20-30 minutes the last 3-4 weeks.  She is now done with the antibiotics for her lung infection, and has a few more days to go on the ones for her stomach.  

We also went outside and drove around the patios at Craig.  Kari couldn’t drive herself because the OT made some bad adjustments to her wheelchair, but hopefully we’ll be able to get it right tomorrow.  It was nice to be outside again—we went and saw a little fish pond (that was very dirty) and saw a turtle too.  It’s always hard to go do stuff, though, as it reminds us of how different life will be.  Lying down in the hospital feels temporary, like you’re going to get better, but being out and about is more of a glimpse of reality.  Still, though, I was thankful for what we were able to do.

Last night, Kari and I also talked a little about the accident.  It was by far the most she’d been able to talk about it since she’s really been conscious.  It still made her panic, but as we talked more, she seemed to be able to handle it.  We went back and read through all the emails that were sent to her in the days following the accident. She was still on all the different church groups’ mailing lists, so she got all the emails that were basically updates on her condition and what had happened.  It was good to go back and read them.  It allowed us to see how much she has improved over time and how right after the accident what our immediate concerns were and how many of them have already been taken care of.  The major requests (other than miraculous healing) that were circling around on the email chains were that Kari would be able to breathe on her own someday, that the insurance would come through for us, that we’d find a good rehab place and that my work would let me stay with her during that time, and that people would keep praying for us and remember us for a long time.  It seems that all those things have happened.  Kari’s website has over 18,000 hits at the moment, and even though it’s slowed down a bit, we still get about 200 hits a day and around 5-10 emails.  Knowing that makes us feel more comfortable about the long term stuff.  Still, I hope that Kari will be physically healed; I can’t imagine anything better than that.

Aaron.  

***Remember NYC, DC, #93***