Busy!

It was a busy day today!  First an appointment with a bath aide then physical therapy then the nurse! David got little naps in between so at least he wasn't too worn out.  He woke up for dinner and stayed awake while we all watched Tron together.  That's actually more than I did but it's kind of how I roll... we eat dinner and then I fall asleep while we watch a movie.  Traditions. ;)

The physical therapist taught me how to use the hoyer lift (the mechanism we would use to move Dave from the bed to a wheel chair) and while we didn't use it on David I DID use it on Owen when he got home from school.  Hahahaha, he was amused by the whole process and it gave me some experience using the lift so it worked out.  The PT also ran over some gentle stretches and exercises we can do at home.  David has lost a lot of muscle mass so we have to be careful with joints like his shoulders that could pop out of the socket if we got too aggressive.  That doesn't sound like fun for anyone. We're going to start sitting him up in bed more regularly with the goal of helping him to sit almost entirely upright but we have to take it slow.  We do have a blood pressure cuff at home so we could always test it ourselves if we're concerned about changes but we're pretty confident we can tell if he's not reacting well to moving around before it becomes a problem.  I follow his lead and sit him up until he says stop then lay him down when he's had enough.  The PT will be out again next week, he's also ordering a different kind of wheel chair than the one that's on order.  He thinks we need one that reclines a bit and the feet go up, like a recliner with wheels in a way.  That way if he needs to lean back he can do that without necessarily having to get out of the chair right away.  I hope we can use it! It would be nice for him to, at the very least, be able to leave the bedroom.  The sunlight doesn't come straight in this window and it would be nice for him to be able to get some sun on his face.  Yeah, it's been sunny!  In FEBRUARY!  Crazy, right?  The crocuses are starting to bloom and everything!

There is an air stagnation warning  in the area all through the weekend and we all woke up feeling kind of yucky.  Our allergies kicked in and we're a little stuffy with the bad air quality.  I noticed a lot of friends on facebook and in texts making comments about not feeling well either, I'm hoping it's just the air and that we're not all getting colds. That's really the last thing Dave needs on top of everything else.  I don't want to have to put the boy in a bubble. ;) 

This is day 3 of the 5 day course of Temodar.  So far no side effects like nausea so that kind of rules.  If he had bad side effects he'd have to stop taking it.  His arms/hands are about the same as far as movement goes so that's also a positive.  His left arm moves pretty freely and I sometimes encourage him to feed himself if it's something easy but he keeps telling me he's not left handed so it's difficult.  I find myself trying to do things left handed myself just to see what kind of obstacles he might be encountering, it's harder than I realized but I pipe back at him with, "I'm not left handed either" and it sparks up a few random Princess Bride quotes because we can't help ourselves.  There's always a reason to quote Princess Bride!

The nurse who saw him today is the admissions nurse who saw him last Thursday when he was seizing and basically unconscious.   His regular nurse is a different lady but she was off today so the first nurse came out to check in on us and bring more supplies.  She was really surprised and happy to see him as alert as he was.  She said his vitals are really great his heart and lungs sound good, his BP was 120/80 and his heart rate and oxygen are both really good.  All good signs, she mentioned that already he's kind of a miracle.  She did notice how much weight he's lost, it's really obvious.  Actually not unlike when we met a million (17) years ago when he was a bachelor who rode his bike everywhere and weighed 130 lbs.  Not that he's back down to 130 but he's headed that direction.  I'm kind of glad we can't weigh him because we'd kind of rather not know. We've got him drinking protein shakes once a day (thanks for the hook up on that, dad!)  so hopefully that will help him keep whatever remains of his muscle and build a little back up if at all possible.It also helps that the milk shake nature of the protein mix hides the flavor of this probiotic stuff he's supposed to drink so that helps him choke down the healthy stuff too!  He doesn't so much like the yogurty flavor of the probiotics, i might have to switch to the pill form to save him some of the ick. 

I like that he's been more awake in the evenings, I think it helps him sleep better at night.  I'm sitting here typing away, watching LOTR: The Two Towers, and listening to the cats pounce at each other up and down the hall and occasionally thump into his bed when they make it all the way to our room...  all the while Dave is sleeping soundly.  Much better than the restless sleep he had a few days ago.  I need to keep that guy awake more often so he gets good quality sleep!