A lot of you have asked me how Brian is doing. Overall, I think he is doing great. He has only had to take his heavy duty pain med twice a day and I have managed to get him out of the house more the last two days for short excursions. He was going stir crazy being cooped up all day! Wayne took him to his follow up doctors appointment today to have the stitches removed and he goes back on the 20th at which time they will set up physical therapy. They told him he could leave the contraption off his arm at home, but he was in so much discomfort with it being off for 30 minutes at the doctors office that he put it back on and got his shoulder iced again as soon as he got home. His biggest issue has been trying to do things with his left hand. We have learned by trial and error what he can and cannot do. I have tried to put myself in his place. Sometimes the things that help the most are little things like repositioning the pillows that support the arm or making sure you hold the door wide open so he neither has to struggle with opening it, but also, so he can easily get through it without banging his sore arm. (I dont think I realized how sore it was until his ADD Pekingese jumped off the back of the couch onto his shoulder causing poor Brian to scream!). Figuring out how to put his seatbelt on in the car was a bit of a challenge, but we ended up looping the arm strap over his head and the back of the seat. A sponge bath proved to be soothing ( I told him that I hadnt had to help him bathe since he was a toddler and now there was so much more of him to bathe!). The t-shirts I cut apart and Gerry rigged with iron-on Velcro and new sweat pants provided him with clean clothes. Hes worried about grading papers next week, but I told him that his dad and I could be his scribes. All in all, his attitude and overall outlook have been good and that is half the battle. Thanks for your kind thoughts and continued prayers. This is a journey and not a race and God is the ultimate healer!
Posted on: Thu, 09 Oct 2014 00:42:53 +0000