Each and every day there is progress. The last week has been a bit more demanding trying to keep up with the inevitable changes and demands posed by a nurses strike (the end of which is in sight). I spend considerably more time at the hospital which means at the moment I rarely leave. It does help to be more involved with the unfamiliar nursing staff and tonight I left to rest at home and check in briefly. That, alongside with our busy schedule has kept me a bit quiet……routine as it turns out is beneficial to us both. Routine this week is a bit out the window but we are all working hard at the hospital to ensure Todd gets everything he needs and more.

Watching Todd heal (slowly) is without a doubt a huge gift and also requires a very clear and honest perspective. It is a bit like watching a snail cross the highway, without markers or references you could easily not notice or forget how far we have come. The steps Todd is making are small, amazing and steady. He is gaining strength and best of all he is more and more attentive! It is a beautiful thing to see Todd shining through the slowly lowering massive dosages of a triple combination of epileptic medications. (We are weaning one off, by lowering the dosage incrementally each week) The seizures remain at bay, we have very little idea of what lies ahead in the next chapter, but we celebrate the day-by-day progresses and achievements. Todd is gaining weight and strength and his therapists are often amazed. I say regularly to Todd that we continue to exceed most all their expectations……..and will continue to do so. We have gone through months in bed, ICU three times, induced coma also three times, and now Todd is… with the aid of a cool apparatus that takes up the majority of his body weight, walking down the hallways and stopping nurses and patients alike in their tracks! He is completely over most soft squooshy mooshy foods and is more in search of good flavors and familiarity. This week’s hits include his morning cereal (just as at home, crunchy is good) and tangerine juice, also brought him some delicious market hall ravioli ( a dependable fav at our house) and ice tea for lunch, enchiladas also went over well. He seems to favor savory over sweet, and his texture preferences sometimes come as a surprise to his therapists but not to me and those that know him. He is a texture kind of guy, likes guacamole but hates avocado from which it comes …that kind of thing. He is sooo ready to move on and we do everything in our power to provide him with the opportunity to do just that! His smiles are more frequent and this morning when we woke up together, side by side, I was greeted with the first sentence in weeks. Todd is still without a doubt as charming as ever! Every time I am faced with doubt or frustration I remind myself that there is no way we have come this far to be even remotely close to done, I also don’t believe that Todd would fight so hard if he did not feel clearly and strongly that he could come back to the life he loved so much.

The other thing I often say is …….we have an army behind us that have every intention of making sure we make it through. Thank you for that.

There are still so many people we would like to see and touch and truth be told I don’t even know where to start. Just keep checking in with us or me please….mail and email is a good place for us all to start.

Now I have to see if I can get my right boot off with a somehow broken zipper without resorting to scissors or an exacto knife! (Thanks to my handy dandy Leatherman the boot did make it off without any permanent damage, phew!) Just when I was contemplating how many days my socks could last, and how to take a bath with my right foot still clad in leather.