The Hall Pass...

I spoke with Karen for a few minutes this morning about what has been going on over the past three days. She said that she had typed a big entry about everything that has been going on, and was going to post it to the blog, but the computer would not cooperate and all her work was promptly lost. She was very frustrated to say the least, so she asked me to write this entry this time, and she will post again just as soon as she can.

She was granted a "hall pass" for the weekend. This is like an exploratory expedition where she could go to Michael's house to see how she will function there. On Saturday she and Michael left in the morning and went to Lowes to purchase a handheld shower wand for the guest bathroom. They chose the guest bathroom because the master bath has a glass surround and she did not want to take a chance with her balance of falling into a big plate glass window. This new wand along with a borrowed shower chair from the hospital afforded Karen the luxury of taking as long of a shower as she wanted all by herself. She reports that it was magnificent. After her shower she made her way to the living room to relax on the couch with "Gooch the cat" who was very glad to see her. Gooch lay on Karen's stomach and purred and purred while she petted and scratched his back. All good things must come to an end as she had to be back to the hospital by midnight on Saturday. Sunday she again went back to the house and had dinner with some friends and family. She was supposed to report back to the hospital by 8:30pm, but was a little late. Whoops!

Back at the hospital her schedule consists of waking up promptly at 7:00am to get ready for the day. She says that she has to get dressed by herself and wheel herself into breakfast. It's hospital food which typically consists of a bowl of raisin bran, a croissant, a glass of milk and some water. Yummy. Physical therapy starts around 8:30am and goes till approximately 10:00am. Today she has what the hospital is calling "recreational therapy". She gets to go on a field trip. The hospital is taking her out for lunch where she will start to adapt to society. I know this sounds weird, but this is where she will experience how get around in a wheelchair, or walk with a cane while carrying a purse and learn how to safely pay for things, all in the uncontrolled environment of actual people in the real world.

She says that she feels like there is a constant struggle between her mind and her body. She knows that she wants to make the left side of her body do things, and sometimes it cooperates, and sometimes it doesn't. When someone tells her to do something with her left side like lift her arm, she says you might as well be asking her to bend a spoon with her mind. She reports that is very surrealistic.

She says she will write to the blog and check her emails when she gets the laptop back. Michael is checking it to find out why it crapped out on them over the weekend.

~Curtis