Today is December 30, I think (sorry--I've lost all sense of time).
Tom has been here a week and it's been a rough ride....one of those "two steps forward, one step backward" kind of situations.

He has been having a lot of difficulty breathing, since he developed pneumonia. Because he can't use his diaphragm to breathe or to support coughing, his breathing is shallow and coughing up the congestion in his lungs is very difficult. They have a technique here at Shepherd that we have learned to help him cough, and that helps. He gets respiratory treatments several times a day. He also saw a lung specialist yesterday and he prescribed medicine to help clear his lungs. I have to say that he seems to be breathing much better today, although he's not over the congestion yet and is still weak.

There are other concerns that we have to deal with--catheters, bowel stuff, itchy rash that developed, a large bedsore left over from Grady, and more. It's challenging but Tom is keeping a good attitude about it all. He would love a good night's sleep, but that's pretty much impossible in a hospital.

He began physical and occupational therapy this week. He is learning how to use muscle reflexes to make movements with his arms to guide the wheelchair and pick things up; he's learning to feed himself--haven't mastered that yet; and he does muscle strengthening and stretching exercises, learning to roll over, etc.

He's had a lot of visitors from Habitat, Soutface, the Fox Theatre, Church, and family friends. He may be too weak to talk sometimes, but he enjoys having visitors talk to him and talk around him.

I'll try to post more over the week-end.

There's a New Year's Eve party tomorrow night--they are having a Wheelchair Limbo contest--Tom is not planning to participate, but I think it'll be fun to watch!