Good morning everyone, We started the morning with visits from our friends from plastic surgery, trauma and ortho. They all seem to think things are progressing in the right direction. My dad is one week in with the jaw wiring and is counting the days and weeks until the surgery to cut those wires. Hopefully it will only be three more weeks. Even with wax on the wires to protect his lips they are still pretty cut up. He is very positive and is continuing to go forward. I just hate to see his mouth like that. He just had his trach cleaned, even though it is capped, they will probably leave it in until all of the surgeries are done. One of the reasons being that it will be easier to put the anesthesia in through the trach rather than intubating him each time because that could damage the trachea and/or the epiglottis. He is shaving as we speak then he will get a little bath. My mom and I already gave him his foot massage. After that I will give him a manicure. He has already done some of his exercises. His tummy is upset so this morning so he has not had any broth this morning. He did get a few hours of rest last night, which is really good. As you can see, my dad is very busy here at Albany Medical Center. That about covers it for this morning. Thanks again for being part of Team Popo! Dana

Looking good!

Hello all, I was so happy to see my dad looking so good today, after not seeing him for a week. He is diligent about doing the exercises that O.T. and P.T. have assigned him. He has a number of different things to do for his legs/feet and also for his hands/fingers/arms. He is really good about doing them and the strength he is showing already is truly remarkable. We are so proud of the progress he is making! The wound vac girls were in today. They cleaned all of the wounds and changed the vacs (one on the upper right leg/hip, and one on each of the lower legs). The wound vacs suction any fluids and debris from the areas they are attached to. It is quite a procedure and of course my dad is a trooper through the whole thing. Those little doo-hickies are a great invention and we are glad my dad has them. A hematoma has developed on the left leg and someone from plastics had to come and incise and drain that before the wound vac could go back on. In addition to the feeding tube the poor guy is on a clear liquid diet due to his jaw being wired shut. He enjoyed some lovely chicken broth and smooshed strawberry jello for breakfast, beef broth, smashed strawberry jello and melted lemon sherbet for lunch and chicken broth, squooshed strawberry jello and melted lemon sherbet for dinner. He enjoyed them all through a straw, of course. He is pretty happy to have anything with flavor after five weeks of nothing. My dad also had a Reiki treatment today which he says is relaxing. You know us, we will take all the healing power we can get around here. Go Joe go! My mom and I also rubbed his feet with some lotion. He is really enjoying his spa treatments. We were wondering if anyone at GHCC would like to take over the foot rubs (with lotion) when he returns to the sauna? We are currently accepting applications for the job? The poor guy needs some rest. Even with meds to aid him he is not sleeping at night. He knows it is important in helping him heal so we hope this weekend will bring some much needed rest. He is very aware of this big smorgasbord involved in getting him better so he is trying like heck to stay on top of all of it. He is really fighting hard and it shows. As usual, team Popo loves the support we are getting, thank you all. please keep up whatever you are doing.

Show-Off!

Robb and I have been sitting here with dad working on his new leg exercises. A couple of the nurses have been razzing him telling him to "show us all you got", "wow, he's getting feisty now, isn't he?" He really is showing off and proving to us that his will and determination is not be touched. He continues to amaze us and everyone on the staff here at Albany Medical Center. We love you so much dad and are with you every grueling step of the way. Keep up the great work! Love, Stac One of the nurses just came in and capped the trach...which is huge for him! Now he doesn't have to try to find the hole with his finger and he can just talk. He is thrilled!

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

Back from X-Rays

To start off, I would like to thank Jason, Omer and everyone at The Hills for making that awesome video card. I just finished viewing it and will show it to my dad as soon as he is ready. Right now they have just brought him back from X-Rays which always entails a lot of moving and shifting of his body. Unfortunately, this very often makes him nauseous. Right now that is a big problem because if he gets sick, they will have to cut the wires in his mouth. We definitely don't want that to happen for two reasons; number one, they already felt like that window of opportunity was almost closed to get the jaw wired shut, and now it's a few days later so it will surely be closed. Number two, my dad will be so pissed (excuse the language) if he has to go through this jaw-wiring procedure again. As it is he is not happy with the extra week they have tacked on to the length of time it has to remain wired. As he said, "I never agreed to that (extra week)". We are trying to convince him that the doctors do have his best interest at heart. You can't blame the poor guy, how miserable does that sound to have your mouth wired shut on top of everything else he is going through. He is still able to make the nurses and doctors laugh...everybody loves him, but you all know that already. Keep praying for him, he is getting stronger everyday (that feeding tube is helping to rebuild his strength).
Thanks,
Stacy

ALMOST DAY 35 -TUESDAY NIGHT, SEPT. 25

HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO MY DARLING SISTER, BEV!! It has been quite some time since I had a chance to blog, so many thanks to the kids for taking over blogging duties. It has been a rough 10 days or so and things were so bad I just didn't feel that I could leave Joe. Some very interesting events have transpired. While we were waiting in the Pre-Op Room for Joe to go to surgery on last Tues. night, the anesthesiologist looked into Joe's mouth to check for dentures, etc., and said, "Wow, has his bite always been like that"? The answer was No, just since the accident. He has been complaining about his teeth hurting since he was semi-conscious - about 3 weeks. The doctor said that of course they hurt. They're completely out of alignment! Now, I can't tell you how many other anesthesiologists had looked in there, nor how many doctors didn't bother to look in there, even though he, and I, had been trying to tell everybody about the pain he was having and that he was very clear that something happened in the accident. I wanted to give that doctor a giant hug, bec. here was yet another guardian angel. Bec. from there, things started to happen. The next day, Joe was taken for a CT Scan, where surprise of all surprises, it was discovered that he had a fractured mandible. The enormous difficulty being that it was now 4 weeks out from the original injury. It had been ignored for that long, so now Reconstructive Facial and ENT joined our little group. My hope was that whatever possible surgery that needed to take place would be done in conjunction with another surgery, so that he would not have to have a general anesthetic every day that week. So I insisted on meeting and talking with the Attending doctor who would do the surgery, no matter what time of the day or night it was. So we waited. Meantime, once Trauma realized that they had missed the fractured jaw, I hit them with, Oh, and what about the numb fingers that he has been complaining about since the beginning, also. So they decided that they better have a Neurology consult. Yes, I guess there is room for them to join Team PoPo also. Our family is multiplying faster that we'd like (and we thought we were done multiplying). More surprises (although not to us bec. Joe has been very specific about his injuries, pain and difficulties. The difficulty is in getting anyone to listen.
O.K., back to the Joe. Early Thurs. a.m. I spoke with the doctor who would be performing the surgery. He explained that the great difficulty in dealing with the location of the fracture was that there was a large facial nerve that kind of ran through the joint that could be involved and if that was damaged during surgery, Joe would lose all control of that side of his face. It seemed like a poor option. The next difficulty was that the injury was already 4 weeks old and had started to fuse together in the totally wrong place. With all of the other injuries that Joe has, it didn't seem prudent to go re-breaking the jaw again, as he is so weak and depleted now. The doctor explained that his best window of opportunity was already gone and the 2nd window was closing quickly. He needed to operate much sooner, rather than later before there was really no opportunity left at all, so I gave my consent for surgery, much to Joe's annoyance. He did not want to go, but he was up at 4:45 ready and waiting. And, yes, we did wait until 6:00 that night. We've learned that this is par for the course. We've also learned that when they say, Oh, hurry up, they're taking him. That means at least a 1 - 2 hour wait in a hallway somewhere or Pre-Op or some other frigid spot. We've learned to bring extra blankets for Joe. We are, unfortunately, getting used to the place.
Back to the fractured mandible. Surgery consisted of prying the jaws open as much as possible, placing arch supports in the roof and the floor of the mouth and then wiring the mouth closed in position. They had to put the tracheostomy back in to facilitate the surgery and bec. he has several more plastic surgeries planned. However, at least this trach could be cuffed to allow Joe to talk. When Robb, Todd and I went in to see him in the Recovery Room, he looked frightening bec. his face and mouth were swollen, his mouth was wired shut and all bloody. The poor guy was completely disoriented and looked terrified. It was very unsettling for us. Trooper that he's been, by the next day he felt a little better.
That day, instead of going back to surgery to clean out the wound with the Staph. they asked Joe if he could take the pain if they did it at his bedside. He said if it meant he didn't have to go back to the O.R., he could take the pain. And that he did. It was quite amazing to watch bec. on the large thigh wound with the Staph infection, there is so little tissue of any kind left, that it is down to just bare muscle. They actually, carefully, moved the muscle to outside of the body to clean and remove any sponges that were place in there, and then replaced it. So far, so good.
I'm going to close for now. I have plenty more gory details where those have come from, but perhaps everyone needs a break. Will do my best to stay a little more current. It is so important to hear from everyone. Tomorrow, I will have some good news bec. I do want to tell about some more special visitors. Please keep up the good thoughts and prayers for Joe. We know they are helping. Love, Cindi

Big day for Joe!

Hi Everybody. My dad got to sit up in a chair today! It was exhausting and a process for everybody but well worth it. That is pretty big news from a guy who has been almost flat on his back for 34 days. He also gave himself a shave today. The phsyical therapist gave him some clay to manuever in his hands to help with the nerve damage in his arms/fingers. He said it feels good to use his hands. They are also pleased with the strength in his ankels and legs. Yesterday, my dad had a filter put in below his kidneys to catch any blood clots from going to his heart. He was in the o.r. for the procedure but had a local anesthetic and was awake during the process. The infectious disease control team thinks the antibiotics are doing the job they need to on the infection. Let's hope the week continues this way. By the way the plastic surgery team thinks it will be another 2 weeks or so before they do anymore grafting b/c they want to see if the integra they put on will allow more of my dads own skin to begin to grow.
That's it for now. I don't know about all of you but today feels like a really great day! Go Joe go!

Dana

hanging in there

No major news to report on my dad. The weekends are usually quiet as far as visits from any doctors. Last week was pretty overwhelming so it was nice to give my dad (and my mom) a break and let my dad (and my mom) try to rest. He is hanging in there (so is she). The doctors will be back bright and early tomorrow morning. Let's all hope and pray that this coming week is full of good news for Joey, we all know he could use some. Thanks for continuing to keep my dad and our family in your thoughts and prayers, it means a great deal to our family.

Dana