Monday, March 15, 2010
YIPPEE
A GIFT FROM GOD...I've been praying for this to happen...I guess I was talking to God a little more than I was listening. Today the Physical Therapy Doc FINALLY called me and he is setting up testing for Mark with a specialist from out of town and maybe we can find out( also finally) what is wrong with Mark and start ...getting some therapy for it! Praise God from Whom all Blessings Flow! AMEN
Wednesday, January 13, 2010
Good News!!!!
Mark returned to therapy at Bellarmine University on Tuesday. Every semester they do a new evaluation of his condition to document any changes--good or bad.
WELL...Mark has a faint reflex reaction happening in both his arms and legs!!!!! This means that there is some nerve reaction happening in there!
Now, if anyone can help us with a Physiatrist (Physical Therapy Physician), we can get moving forward.
Ideas anyone??????
WELL...Mark has a faint reflex reaction happening in both his arms and legs!!!!! This means that there is some nerve reaction happening in there!
Now, if anyone can help us with a Physiatrist (Physical Therapy Physician), we can get moving forward.
Ideas anyone??????
Sunday, January 10, 2010
Up and at 'em!!
Hi everyone! I hope that everyone had a wonderful holiday and that you were able to be with your loved ones. Mark and I really enjoyed the times when there was quiet around here--albeit they were often disrupted by the joy of our home remodeling project. HOPEFULLY it soon will be done. We are down to about 10 little things that need to be finished...IF they GET finished....who knows!
We've enjoyed the past few last days of the holidays...last week was very slow and easy...tomorrow we start full speed ahead. Therapy, gym and school start again and we are on the go once again! It is good that we HAVE to go because we've been just treading water for the past month but it's been good to get to have this time together to laugh and talk and dream together. It's kind of like being on our honeymoon again only this time, we will NOT be on a ship stranded in the port of Miami with some mystery disease onboard that has caused the CDC to shut it down. This time, it's a wheelchair...kind of the same thing only different, I suppose.
Some kiddos in our neighborhood made a snow angel in our yard. It was very pretty and it reminded me of how angels are always looking over out shoulders. I know that there have been many of them holding us nearer to God in the past (almost) 4 years. My prayers turn back to all of those who are enduring hardship like Mark and I have...Jim and Fran, Jim and Val, Jani, Teresa and her daughter's family....the list goes on. I know that hardship and illness make us stronger but it's still and emotional rollercoaster that take it's toll! I am hoping that 2010 makes all of us believe more and suffer less....
The next BIG goal for me is getting all of the "stuff" out of the POD in our driveway, and into the garage so I can (A) get that stupid thing out of my driveway (for which my neighbors will be shouting "Hallelujah" at the tops of their lungs), and (B) get it sorted and replaced and tossed if necessary. I will be sending out APB's as soon as I get the first round of "stuff" out of the garage so round 2 can be put in! I am still amazed at how much we have collected over the years. I used to be so good about keeping it down to a minimum but I guess since we haven't moved in a while (13 years here -- the longest we've lived anywhere), I've gotten slack. I guess I know what my 2010 resolution is: declutter and organize my life! A scary thought to many of you who know me well!!
If anyone knows Dr. Kenneth Mook--we have been trying to get in to see him so Mark can get back into regularly timed therapy -- we could use a good bug in his ear to get him to return calls and emails! Mark really HAS to have supervised therapy and right now, Bellarmine twice a week and what I can provide for him myself are it...SO if anyone knows a Physiatrist who is willing to oversee his case and would be available....PLEASE, PLEASE, PLEASE let me know!!!! Mark IS going to get better the Red Army is on my side and God is hearing every word we say to him. It's not happening fast, but it WILL happen.
Other than that, our life is pretty much boring and day to day. I am kind of dreading going back to the zoom, zoom life we have but then, I am kind of looking forward to a routine again. God Bless every one of you this new year... you are dear wonderful people and we appreciate all of your care and support!!
Laura
Thursday, December 24, 2009
Laura's Mechanical Aptitude
I'm finally figuring out that Laura has more mechanical aptitude than admits to! Since I'm unable to assemble and repair things she's had to take over. Yesterday she assembled our new laundry cart with very little difficulty! When she first looked she said she couldn't do it but with a little coaxing she did a great job. Before she was done she was using a ratchet wrench like a pro.
Today, she sent me this cartoon. She says it describes her mechanical abilities!
Today, she sent me this cartoon. She says it describes her mechanical abilities!
Saturday, December 5, 2009
Today's Guidepost
Hi Everyone!
Today when I read my Guidepost devotional, I realized how God was speaking to me...AGAIN!! So, I wanted to share it with you. Maybe it was just intended for me to remember the power of God's love and the love Mark and I share. Maybe it wasn't but here it is!
Kiss of Faithby Genell Dawson
Late on that Sunday afternoon, the phone rang. My husband, Clyde, had promised to be home ages ago. What now? I thought.
“Maybe Dad stopped to buy you a birthday present,” my daughter, Amber, offered, picking up the receiver. I rolled my eyes. My birthday was still five days away, and Amber knew just as well as I did that Clyde always put off buying gifts until the last minute. I checked my watch. Already 4:30. Typical workaholic Clyde. If he wasn’t logging overtime as a facilities engineer at the local Toyota plant like today, he was working through our church, even spending his last few vacations on mission trips in Mexico and Russia.
Amber turned to me, a strange look on her face, and held out the phone. “It’s Mission Hospital,” she said. “They want to talk to you—about Dad.”
Clyde had been in a car accident. I was praying for him before I even hung up the phone. Amber and I jumped in the car. I rattled off numbers as I drove. Rev. Dudley Bristow from our old church; my boss and good friend, Janet; people from our current congregation. Amber called them on the cell.
Lately it seemed Clyde and I spent what little time we did have together arguing about the time we spent apart. We always kissed and made up in the end, though. After almost 20 years, that simple act was still a powerful reminder of the love that had drawn us together. Please, God, I prayed, pulling up to the hospital, give us more time.
The chaplain came to talk to us. “Your husband has been critically injured and is in surgery,” she said. “You need to get his family here as soon as you can.”
We made more frantic calls. Our older daughter, Michelle, at college in Arizona. Clyde’s twin brother, Curt, and their older brother, Jerry. Our family physician, Dr. Pino. One thought kept going through my mind: Was Clyde still alive? In the background the same prayer repeated steadily like a heartbeat: Please, God, give us more time.
By 1:00 A.M. more than 100 family and friends were gathered in the waiting area. Finally a surgeon with blood on his scrubs, his deeply lined eyes just visible over his mask, emerged from the operating suite and took me aside. “Mrs. Dawson, your husband has suffered grave injuries. He’s been lacerated from his ribs to his pelvic bone back to his spine. His stomach, liver and kidneys are badly damaged. We’ve done everything we can, but he’s in a coma. I’m very sorry, but I don’t think he will make it through the night.”
All that got through to me at that moment was that Clyde was still alive. And that meant he could be healed. “I have my faith,” I said. The doctor sighed. “You’re going to need more than that, I’m afraid,” he said.
I’d relied on my faith my entire life, taking strength in knowing that God could help me through anything. Now my husband was dying and his doctor was telling me not even God could save his life. What if it really was too late? What if there was nothing more even God could do? The prayer circling my mind continued, longer now. Please, God, give us more time. Give me whatever I need to help Clyde.
They let me see Clyde. It was hard to tell where the tubes and machines ended and he began. A tube was down his throat so I couldn’t kiss him, and I had to wear protective gloves just to touch him. When I reached to stroke his brow, the nurse stopped me. “Be careful. His bones are fractured,” she said.
I drew back and choked out, “I’m sorry,” then fled to the waiting room.
I couldn’t sleep, even with a sedative. Thank goodness my sister-in-law had brought my Bible and prayer journal.
The nurses allowed me five minutes of visiting time each hour and, at first, that was all I could bear. During the day Amber or Michelle or a friend from church would go into the ICU with me. At night it was just Clyde and me. The more I sat with my husband the harder it was to leave when the nurses asked.
On the third night, I pulled off the gloves, hoping Clyde would respond to my touch. I stroked his cheek, his forehead, the scraggly hair growing out of his chin. “Keep holding on, baby. Only twenty more days till our twentieth anniversary.” I even wrote that in my journal.
The fifth day I remarked to a nurse as I sat with Clyde, “The doctor didn’t think he’d make it through the first night. Maybe he’ll wake up soon.”
The nurse reached out and touched my shoulder. “Mrs. Dawson, I think it’s important you understand your husband is still in very critical condition,” she said. “He’s on dialysis, his spleen has been removed, and his other organs are shutting down one by one. I’m sorry, but he’s far from waking up.”
Back in the waiting room friends and family surprised me with a cake. My birthday. How could I celebrate my birth when my husband was dying? I excused myself to talk to Dr. Pino. “Please, you’ve got to be honest with me,” I begged him.
He shook his head slowly. “Genell, you need to prepare for the worst.”
I felt my knees buckle. Only through the most intense prayer had I been able to keep it together these past five days. But things were getting worse, not better. Clyde was still holding on. How would I? God, I don’t know how to pray any harder. Give me more faith.
The nurses stopped asking me to leave after five minutes. I bathed and shaved Clyde as best I could around the tubes and bandages. “You’re wasting away. Wouldn’t you like to wake up and have a chile relleno right now?” I asked. One day I picked up his hand and pressed it to my lips. “You already missed my birthday. You don’t want to miss our anniversary too, do you?” I felt so connected to him that it seemed like his body was an extension of my own, that it was my breath flowing into him.
It was the same way with my prayers. I prayed so deeply that prayer became less of an act than a state of being. And I was surrounded by hundreds of others praying for my husband’s recovery—relatives, friends, our church family, even people in Mexico and Russia whom Clyde had met on his mission trips. We prayed for Clyde’s organs one by one. “Help Clyde’s kidneys work again, Lord. Heal the damage to his liver.” We prayed for his foot and the doctors saved it even though it was broken in dozens of places and had become gangrenous.
Another five days passed, but now I knew better than to think that meant Clyde was out of the woods. Instead I took joy in the little things. Like being able to kiss him again. A tracheotomy allowed the tube to come out of his throat at last. His facial muscles were still tensed up in a grimace so I massaged around his mouth, hoping to ease it into a smile. “I love you, Clyde. I’m sorry about all the times we ever argued,” I said. “Please wake up, baby.” I rested my head on the pillow beside his. And I felt not Clyde but God answer me. Be still and trust me.
On day 21 I went home to shower, but then it was right back to the ICU, to Clyde. I nodded to the nurse and turned to look at my husband. I’d just given him a bath and shave, and he looked rested. I bent down to kiss him hello like always. Just before I pulled away, I thought I felt his lips move. I drew back and stared at him. His eyes were still closed. Again I kissed him. He puckered up and kissed me back! Clyde had kissed me back! And that kiss was a promise, just like the kiss that sealed our wedding vows 20 years earlier. Except this time the promise was not so much from Clyde as from God, that he was returning my husband to me, that he was giving us more time after all.
“Nurse, my husband kissed me!”
“It’s likely just a reflex,” she said.
“No, watch,” I insisted. I kissed Clyde and again he puckered his lips and kissed me back.
The nurse’s eyes widened. “I have to get the doctor.”
I kissed Clyde twice more before the doctor came. Then I kissed him again. He kissed me back. The doctor squeezed Clyde’s hand. He squeezed back. Later that same day Clyde started to wake up. Two days later, on October 31, we marked our twentieth anniversary. “We’ll spend much more of the next twenty years together, won’t we, baby?” I asked. Clyde still couldn’t talk, but for me his kiss was answer enough.
I’d sat by my husband’s bedside those long days not knowing if he would wake up again. The doctor had been right. My faith had not been enough. But all I had to do was reach out and ask, and I received more than I ever could have imagined. God gives us faith as generously as he gives his love. And both know no bounds.
Today when I read my Guidepost devotional, I realized how God was speaking to me...AGAIN!! So, I wanted to share it with you. Maybe it was just intended for me to remember the power of God's love and the love Mark and I share. Maybe it wasn't but here it is!
Kiss of Faithby Genell Dawson
Late on that Sunday afternoon, the phone rang. My husband, Clyde, had promised to be home ages ago. What now? I thought.
“Maybe Dad stopped to buy you a birthday present,” my daughter, Amber, offered, picking up the receiver. I rolled my eyes. My birthday was still five days away, and Amber knew just as well as I did that Clyde always put off buying gifts until the last minute. I checked my watch. Already 4:30. Typical workaholic Clyde. If he wasn’t logging overtime as a facilities engineer at the local Toyota plant like today, he was working through our church, even spending his last few vacations on mission trips in Mexico and Russia.
Amber turned to me, a strange look on her face, and held out the phone. “It’s Mission Hospital,” she said. “They want to talk to you—about Dad.”
Clyde had been in a car accident. I was praying for him before I even hung up the phone. Amber and I jumped in the car. I rattled off numbers as I drove. Rev. Dudley Bristow from our old church; my boss and good friend, Janet; people from our current congregation. Amber called them on the cell.
Lately it seemed Clyde and I spent what little time we did have together arguing about the time we spent apart. We always kissed and made up in the end, though. After almost 20 years, that simple act was still a powerful reminder of the love that had drawn us together. Please, God, I prayed, pulling up to the hospital, give us more time.
The chaplain came to talk to us. “Your husband has been critically injured and is in surgery,” she said. “You need to get his family here as soon as you can.”
We made more frantic calls. Our older daughter, Michelle, at college in Arizona. Clyde’s twin brother, Curt, and their older brother, Jerry. Our family physician, Dr. Pino. One thought kept going through my mind: Was Clyde still alive? In the background the same prayer repeated steadily like a heartbeat: Please, God, give us more time.
By 1:00 A.M. more than 100 family and friends were gathered in the waiting area. Finally a surgeon with blood on his scrubs, his deeply lined eyes just visible over his mask, emerged from the operating suite and took me aside. “Mrs. Dawson, your husband has suffered grave injuries. He’s been lacerated from his ribs to his pelvic bone back to his spine. His stomach, liver and kidneys are badly damaged. We’ve done everything we can, but he’s in a coma. I’m very sorry, but I don’t think he will make it through the night.”
All that got through to me at that moment was that Clyde was still alive. And that meant he could be healed. “I have my faith,” I said. The doctor sighed. “You’re going to need more than that, I’m afraid,” he said.
I’d relied on my faith my entire life, taking strength in knowing that God could help me through anything. Now my husband was dying and his doctor was telling me not even God could save his life. What if it really was too late? What if there was nothing more even God could do? The prayer circling my mind continued, longer now. Please, God, give us more time. Give me whatever I need to help Clyde.
They let me see Clyde. It was hard to tell where the tubes and machines ended and he began. A tube was down his throat so I couldn’t kiss him, and I had to wear protective gloves just to touch him. When I reached to stroke his brow, the nurse stopped me. “Be careful. His bones are fractured,” she said.
I drew back and choked out, “I’m sorry,” then fled to the waiting room.
I couldn’t sleep, even with a sedative. Thank goodness my sister-in-law had brought my Bible and prayer journal.
The nurses allowed me five minutes of visiting time each hour and, at first, that was all I could bear. During the day Amber or Michelle or a friend from church would go into the ICU with me. At night it was just Clyde and me. The more I sat with my husband the harder it was to leave when the nurses asked.
On the third night, I pulled off the gloves, hoping Clyde would respond to my touch. I stroked his cheek, his forehead, the scraggly hair growing out of his chin. “Keep holding on, baby. Only twenty more days till our twentieth anniversary.” I even wrote that in my journal.
The fifth day I remarked to a nurse as I sat with Clyde, “The doctor didn’t think he’d make it through the first night. Maybe he’ll wake up soon.”
The nurse reached out and touched my shoulder. “Mrs. Dawson, I think it’s important you understand your husband is still in very critical condition,” she said. “He’s on dialysis, his spleen has been removed, and his other organs are shutting down one by one. I’m sorry, but he’s far from waking up.”
Back in the waiting room friends and family surprised me with a cake. My birthday. How could I celebrate my birth when my husband was dying? I excused myself to talk to Dr. Pino. “Please, you’ve got to be honest with me,” I begged him.
He shook his head slowly. “Genell, you need to prepare for the worst.”
I felt my knees buckle. Only through the most intense prayer had I been able to keep it together these past five days. But things were getting worse, not better. Clyde was still holding on. How would I? God, I don’t know how to pray any harder. Give me more faith.
The nurses stopped asking me to leave after five minutes. I bathed and shaved Clyde as best I could around the tubes and bandages. “You’re wasting away. Wouldn’t you like to wake up and have a chile relleno right now?” I asked. One day I picked up his hand and pressed it to my lips. “You already missed my birthday. You don’t want to miss our anniversary too, do you?” I felt so connected to him that it seemed like his body was an extension of my own, that it was my breath flowing into him.
It was the same way with my prayers. I prayed so deeply that prayer became less of an act than a state of being. And I was surrounded by hundreds of others praying for my husband’s recovery—relatives, friends, our church family, even people in Mexico and Russia whom Clyde had met on his mission trips. We prayed for Clyde’s organs one by one. “Help Clyde’s kidneys work again, Lord. Heal the damage to his liver.” We prayed for his foot and the doctors saved it even though it was broken in dozens of places and had become gangrenous.
Another five days passed, but now I knew better than to think that meant Clyde was out of the woods. Instead I took joy in the little things. Like being able to kiss him again. A tracheotomy allowed the tube to come out of his throat at last. His facial muscles were still tensed up in a grimace so I massaged around his mouth, hoping to ease it into a smile. “I love you, Clyde. I’m sorry about all the times we ever argued,” I said. “Please wake up, baby.” I rested my head on the pillow beside his. And I felt not Clyde but God answer me. Be still and trust me.
On day 21 I went home to shower, but then it was right back to the ICU, to Clyde. I nodded to the nurse and turned to look at my husband. I’d just given him a bath and shave, and he looked rested. I bent down to kiss him hello like always. Just before I pulled away, I thought I felt his lips move. I drew back and stared at him. His eyes were still closed. Again I kissed him. He puckered up and kissed me back! Clyde had kissed me back! And that kiss was a promise, just like the kiss that sealed our wedding vows 20 years earlier. Except this time the promise was not so much from Clyde as from God, that he was returning my husband to me, that he was giving us more time after all.
“Nurse, my husband kissed me!”
“It’s likely just a reflex,” she said.
“No, watch,” I insisted. I kissed Clyde and again he puckered his lips and kissed me back.
The nurse’s eyes widened. “I have to get the doctor.”
I kissed Clyde twice more before the doctor came. Then I kissed him again. He kissed me back. The doctor squeezed Clyde’s hand. He squeezed back. Later that same day Clyde started to wake up. Two days later, on October 31, we marked our twentieth anniversary. “We’ll spend much more of the next twenty years together, won’t we, baby?” I asked. Clyde still couldn’t talk, but for me his kiss was answer enough.
I’d sat by my husband’s bedside those long days not knowing if he would wake up again. The doctor had been right. My faith had not been enough. But all I had to do was reach out and ask, and I received more than I ever could have imagined. God gives us faith as generously as he gives his love. And both know no bounds.
Sunday, November 29, 2009
Survival!
Hi Everyone!!! Mark and I have survived the transition!!!
We've managed to make it thru the first 2 weeks without killing each other and so far, I've only dropped Mark twice--both without any major repercussions! :)
It has been a very difficult transition for both of us. First of all, we had to figure out how to "DO" everything...move Mark, feed Mark, bathe Mark, etc. And I had to realize that "I am not alone" anymore. I'd forgotten how "alone" I had been and how different it is to have someone depend on you for every little thing. It's almost like having a baby to care for...in addition to trying to supervise the final part of the renovations (many of which are not anywhere close to being done)...and taking Mark to therapy and work outs at Milestone. Needless to say, I've dropped a few balls along the way and I don't like that!!! It's hard to be a perfectionist in "Reality" where perfection doesn't exist!!
We got the hardwood floors installed both upstairs and down. I am SO upset about them!!! I love how beautiful they look, and eventually, I will get them cleaned and I will be happy about them BUT...the installers brought a saw INTO THE HOUSE because no one from the contractor's was here to supervise and Mark had therapy SO...they set off the alarm system, had the fire department here and left about 4 inches of red dust in every nook and cranny of my home...every cabinet, every drawer, ever closet!!! I have been trying to clean the dust off of the kitchen items just so I could cook...I haven't even gotten to the cleaning the house part. I am so frustrated...and the contractor says, "Oh, they shouldn't have done that"--YA THINK?????
This too shall pass...and things will continue as we know them...and all will be well with our lives and our world...and eventually, I won't be embarassed for people to come to our home and I will enjoy seeing them...Just not today! :)
Thank you all for supporting us and remembering us and keeping us in your prayers. I am sorry to complain when I have so much to be grateful for...a beautiful home, a wonderful husband, family and friends who love and support me...sometimes it is overwhelming!!!
What doesn't kill us makes us stronger! :)
We've managed to make it thru the first 2 weeks without killing each other and so far, I've only dropped Mark twice--both without any major repercussions! :)
It has been a very difficult transition for both of us. First of all, we had to figure out how to "DO" everything...move Mark, feed Mark, bathe Mark, etc. And I had to realize that "I am not alone" anymore. I'd forgotten how "alone" I had been and how different it is to have someone depend on you for every little thing. It's almost like having a baby to care for...in addition to trying to supervise the final part of the renovations (many of which are not anywhere close to being done)...and taking Mark to therapy and work outs at Milestone. Needless to say, I've dropped a few balls along the way and I don't like that!!! It's hard to be a perfectionist in "Reality" where perfection doesn't exist!!
We got the hardwood floors installed both upstairs and down. I am SO upset about them!!! I love how beautiful they look, and eventually, I will get them cleaned and I will be happy about them BUT...the installers brought a saw INTO THE HOUSE because no one from the contractor's was here to supervise and Mark had therapy SO...they set off the alarm system, had the fire department here and left about 4 inches of red dust in every nook and cranny of my home...every cabinet, every drawer, ever closet!!! I have been trying to clean the dust off of the kitchen items just so I could cook...I haven't even gotten to the cleaning the house part. I am so frustrated...and the contractor says, "Oh, they shouldn't have done that"--YA THINK?????
This too shall pass...and things will continue as we know them...and all will be well with our lives and our world...and eventually, I won't be embarassed for people to come to our home and I will enjoy seeing them...Just not today! :)
Thank you all for supporting us and remembering us and keeping us in your prayers. I am sorry to complain when I have so much to be grateful for...a beautiful home, a wonderful husband, family and friends who love and support me...sometimes it is overwhelming!!!
What doesn't kill us makes us stronger! :)
Sunday, November 8, 2009
Help on Tuesday
Hi Y'all,
I'm so excited...our dear, wonderful friends, Mike and Mary Drury who used to live across from us in SC, are coming from St. Louis to help this week. I can't wait to see them!!!
For all of you who responded, thank you and I will be in touch with you tomorrow (Monday). For those who didn't have a chance to respond, you will still have a chance to to help the Radells move. We are having hardwoods put in downstairs so, all of the upstairs "stuff" that is now downstairs and in the POD will have to be redistributed. More on that to follow...
IF anyone with big shoulders could help me Thurs. AM moving Mark's airbed, around 9:00 or 9:30, I would REALLY appreciate it. It isn't as heavy as it is cumbersome but we own it (by a quirk of fate) so it has to go home...it'll probably be on eBay on Friday! :)
God Bless All Of You for all of the things you do to make these things happen for us!
Love,
Laura
I'm so excited...our dear, wonderful friends, Mike and Mary Drury who used to live across from us in SC, are coming from St. Louis to help this week. I can't wait to see them!!!
For all of you who responded, thank you and I will be in touch with you tomorrow (Monday). For those who didn't have a chance to respond, you will still have a chance to to help the Radells move. We are having hardwoods put in downstairs so, all of the upstairs "stuff" that is now downstairs and in the POD will have to be redistributed. More on that to follow...
IF anyone with big shoulders could help me Thurs. AM moving Mark's airbed, around 9:00 or 9:30, I would REALLY appreciate it. It isn't as heavy as it is cumbersome but we own it (by a quirk of fate) so it has to go home...it'll probably be on eBay on Friday! :)
God Bless All Of You for all of the things you do to make these things happen for us!
Love,
Laura
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
