DAY 36 - THURSDAY, SEPTEMBER 27

Greetings. I hardly know where to start, but I can't get beyond this first sentence without thanking Jason Perra and Omer for producing, directing, filming and delivering the video greeting card. Joe has watched it in sections, as everything is so tiring for him and emotions exhaust him. He absolutely loved the video and was so overwhelmed by the number of people praying for him and wishing him well. You know he would love to be playing golf and if he has his way, he will be again. He was moved to tears and for the first time in 5 weeks, actually asked to be alone for a few minutes. He, and we, can't thank Jason and Omer enough. He swears he is going to watch it every day until he gets well. That's going to be a tall order, as his days are getting busier.
Joe also has no idea about how many of our friends, old and new, have been in contact by cards, e-mails, voicemails and internet blogs. On the rare occasion when he has been able, we have read 1 or 2 cards to him. That is about all he can usually withstand at a time before exhaustion takes over. But we have saved absolutely everything for him and he will have time when he gets to a different stage in his recovery. I have Scott printing out everything on the blog so that when Joe is ready, he will see just how many people were praying for him, as we continue to do for our friends from the SICU, the Carr family (Hi, Dana and Courtney - I am praying for you) and the Kitsock family (Love to Susie & John, Todd, Chrissy & Jenny - we are praying for you) and my new friend, Jocelyn, whose Mom was hit by a car, and the Dicksons (yes, Donald was doing volunteer work for his church and fell off a ladder - now that's not fair!!).
However, back to joe's progress. The sitting in the chair thing is a bit deceiving as it kind of implies that he is in a place that he is not, at least not yet. They were supposed to use a hoist, but instead the male nurse and 5 male aides lifted him and kind of plunked him in the chair. It wasn't a very good experience, as it put Joe in a lot of pain in the healing, but still fractured, ribs and the cracked vertebrae. It also did not help the wound on the back side or the thigh that he was not pillowed or padded on the chair. So, after withstanding about 1/2 hour of that, creating more nausea and lightheadedness, which is to be expected, he was put back to bed. As Stacy explained, nausea is a huge problem for someone with their jaws wired, bec. the reason the wires would have to be cut immediately is that should vomiting occur, he would have to be suctioned immediately because all of that material would be going right into the lungs, creating a pneumonia. We don't need it. So it was decided today that he would not be getting out of bed for a while. All the moving and any physical and occupational therapy would have to be done in bed for a while.
O.K., so I have spent my day today facilitating the continued course of his well-being in lots of ways and after spending more than 5 hours of solid talking, I am feeling much more at ease and that most of us are finally on the same page. Halleluia!! We're also trying to institute a regimen of holistic therapies to work in conjunction with the medical/surgical regimens. That is starting to fall into place nicely as he is to have his first Reiki treatment this afternoon. Also in line, hopefully, will be reflexology and aromatherapy, and when he is ready, massage therapy. I've already started massaging his feet with lotion, which he says feels good. We've also getting him started on lactobaccilus, which will help replenish the good flora in the body, which will be destroyed along with the bad bacteria during the lengthy course of very strong antibiotics that he will have to be on to combat the Staph and the other infection of gram negative rods. So, this is all very positive news. However, of course, Infectious Diseases, although pleased with the progress, still says we are by no means out of the woods in that department. And, Plastics is saying the same thing. They still have quite a bit of work to do and are definitely saying they are not out of the woods yet. Unfortunately, the wound under the wound Vac on the left tibia had developed a hematoma, which they opened yesterday when they took the wound Vacs down. This is disappointing, but the same thing had happened to the right tibia earlier on. It was incised and drained and has continued to do well after that. We can only hope for the same result on the left tibia. The wound Vac gals (whom we love) will be back tomorrow and Plastics and everyone will have a look. By the way, the wound Vac nurses are the ET team. I believe that stands for Epithelial Therapy. It is very specialized. There are 3 of them and they do the whole hospital on Monday, Wednesday and Friday. They are wonderful and we have welcomed them happily into the growing Family,
I have saved the best news for last. Joe's head orthopedic doctor came in and said that according to all of the exhausting X-Rays that they took yesterday, everything looks fabulous and if those were the only injuries, he would let him start weight-bearing at 6 weeks instead of 3 months. Of course, those are not the only injuries. But he had him do a series of minor movements to see just how much muscle tone was left and how much he could do on his own and gave him some goals to reach. Joey is nothing, if not goal oriented, so we have no doubt he'll be working as hard as he can. We are ecstatic!!!
So, thank you so much for your caring and loving thoughts and prayers. Everything is helping and we are not giving up the good fight for a minute. Feeling very guardedly (we have learned that things can go in another direction very quickly) encouraged, Love, Cindi