Day 73 (Nov 6)

Tobias' brother came to visit today from his university, a three hour plus drive away.  We saw Tobias in the morning with Sebastian and his girlfriend and met his grandmother and her husband at the hospital before going to lunch with everyone.  We love pho soup.  Because of the larger entourage, we took longer than usual to get out of the house and we missed the morning PT session.  Lucky for Tobias, his normal PT was working the weekend shift, so she made sure that she fit Tobias in for her first visit.  The report she gave of Tobias' progress was effusive.  He spoke more readily that she has every experienced and was more alert for his therapy.  Tobias was able to tell her the name of both parents and he read her name badge to show that he knew her name.  He knew the year and told his PT that it hurt his arm when she moved it to overcome the rigidity.  She said that she was sorry, but it was still going to be necessary to keep his arm from getting stuck.

Tobias was still in good form after the therapy and he was able to speak to his brother and grandmother.  His grandma held his hand and Tobias was able to give it a squeeze and also moved his hand a few inches to show grandma how much progress he had made.  Tobias' good form put us all in a good mood and we left for lunch in high spirits.  After lunch Sebastian asked to go shopping at an Asian grocery store and we had the entertaining experience of walking through the thick crowds and exotic items while Sebastian checked off his shopping list for ingredients to make the perfect ramen.

We dropped Sebastian and his girlfriend downtown for their walking tour of the big city.  Today was quite different from our normal routine and it felt like a return to our former lives.  We even stopped off for ice cream, which is the first guilty pleasure that we've taken time for outside of my sister's home or the hospital.  I felt a little guilty for enjoying myself while Tobias was stuck in the hospital, but for the first time since the injury I could imagine returning to my prior life where I'm not needed at Tobias' bedside for the majority of my waking hours.  I have Tobias to thank for this release.  His recovery is still a long way off, but I can see that sometime in the future, he won't need care 24x7.  We don't know if he'll walk again or even be able to support himself enough to aid in his own care, but his recent successes have given us not only hope but plausible expectation that he'll be able to communicate reasonably with us and move some of his limbs.  His reduction in storming has helped me to feel okay about leaving him unattended for an hour or two and I believe that he'll continue to heal and put more distance between himself and the storming.

While we were at lunch the resident doctor came in and removed Tobias’ staples.  Now we only have the feeding peg to go and all foreign objects will be gone from his body.

Before…

…After

Katja and I took Tobias for a long walk.  It's Saturday and there are hardly any cars in the parking lot so we used the side of the empty lot as our path and we walked for just shy of half an hour before turning around and coming back the same way.  Tobias was alert for much of the walk, but didn't speak to us much.  When we returned to the hospital, we practiced drinking juice with Tobias.  The juice that we use is thickened so that it runs slower done the throat.  This gives Tobias more time to coordinate his swallow and he is able to guide the thick juice into his stomach instead of his lungs.  Tobias was able to sip and swallow almost the entire 4 oz in the cup.  This is much better than his previous attempts.  He isn't getting much of his caloric intake through his mouth, but he is making progress and we can now start feeding him broth as well as the sugary juice.  The hospital is out of the thickener additive, but we can buy some on our own to thicken the clear soup.  The speech therapist showed me how to test the liquid to ensure that it has the right consistency.  The juice that we gave Tobias tonight, however, is already thickened in the container and its only drawback is the need to brush his teeth every time we feed him.  After finished about 80% of the package of juice, Tobias finally started to waver.  He took longer to start sipping and struggled to swallow all of the juice in his mouth.  Finally he drifted off to sleep with a little of the liquid still in his mouth and we gave him a break before brushing his teeth and putting him in the bed for the night.  Right now he’s intently watching nature videos from David Attenborough.

Hope over fear.