Click Here For Free Blog Backgrounds!!!
Blogaholic Designs

Tuesday, February 28, 2006

Little blessings (in no particular order)


Looks like March is coming in like a lamb. February sure went out like one!

I was able to get off work a little early yesterday and today and enjoy the nice weather. Took a walk and saw the neighborhood again. Felt good.
Jess is back at school. Lots of work to make up, but she'll get there. Stressing about not being able to work, but SHE DOES HAVE A MEAL PLAN, so she really doesn't have to buy groceries...
I finally ripped some CD's and downloaded my Mp3 player I got for Christmas. Took it to workout Monday morning. The ear buds kept popping out, so I didn't get to enjoy. I've replaced those and look forward to some of my favorite classic rock music to exercise by tomorrow. Yea!
Made the most yummy Italian Crockpot beef sandwiches for supper tonight. It was great to walk in the house this afternoon and smell a delicious supper cooking. Just had to mix up some salad and bake the Ciabatta buns.
Anyone else watch Grey's Anatomy? Jessi and I love it and make sure to watch every Sunday night. Sometimes she's in Hastings watching, and I'm at home, and we call each other during commercial breaks.
Grace is walking a little bit! Leslie said she takes a couple of steps between things now.
Only five and a half months until our cruise!
Aren't these guys just too cute? This is their "One year" photo done at the studio.
Some sad news about a friend who is ill. I so wish the outcome was different, but hospice will help her and her family. Those people are amazing. They make the worst time of life bearable, and are a huge blessing to everyone they serve.
Wyatt has a new kissing game and makes the best "fish lips"!

Friday, February 24, 2006

Back to "normal"

Our life is slowly returning to pre-accident normalcy. Jess is pretty independent now, drives her car around and doesn't need the walker or any other gadget to help her walk. She does have a "hitch" in her hip and does the "Weebles wobble" thing when she walks, but she says she has no pain. (Side note: I found out yesterday that her orthopedic specialist is a former gymnastics world champion, and was part of an Olympic team.) Her friend Megan spends lots of time with her - in fact, right now they are on my bed giggling at some MTV show. I'm going to kick them out in a minute so I can get to bed. :o)
Greg and I are both back to work full time, with the exception of going with Jess to the occasional doctor's appointment. My first day back was Wednesday, and I've been going full blast ever since. I'm not complaining - it feels good to be productive again. I spent too much time in front of the TV with the girl when I was home!
Jessi called me at work yesterday afternoon and invited me to the movies last night. We went to see "Walk the Line". I enjoyed it very much, even though I don't "do" country music. I left the theater with a grin, thinking about how much my mother would have LOVED this movie!
That's the update for today. Back to boring is pretty good right now!

Sunday, February 19, 2006


We spent yesterday at the hospital in Omaha where Greg's dad was sent after spending Thursday evening through Saturday morning at York General. He is quite ill with some kind of infection which is causing his white count to fall. Normally illness raises your white count, but since he had the stem-cell transplant, his will fall when he gets sick. Since none of us had a flu shot, in order to see him we have to wear a gown, mask, and gloves. Greg went today for awhile, but Jess and I stayed home.
Once again we ask for healing prayers and kind thoughts that he has a quick recovery.

Jess went to church with us today. She refused to take her walker or to use the lift chair to get up the stairs. I don't know how she did it, but she climbed all those stairs by herself. She was really not wanting any attention from anyone in the congregation and made us promise we'd go straight to the car and not chat after the service. If she could have run, she would have. :o)
She's about out of Percocet, and is spreading them out so she's only taking a couple each day.
That's about it around here. Yawn - I think it's time for a nap.

Friday, February 17, 2006

Her recovery continues...

We had a good day yesterday - the cystogram showed no leaks in Jessi's bladder, so the urologist took out the catheter. She sees him again in a week to make sure all is well.
She really wanted to go to Hastings to see some friends, so we drove to her dorm to get some things, then visited people for a little while. I got to meet her McD's coworkers. On the way home she commented that it was so nice to get out and see people! :o)
She's still using the walker and taking the Percocet. I imagine today will be bad for pain since she was in and out of the car so much yesterday and on her feet a lot.
Greg and I are trying to get back into our routines as much as possible. We each are still having to take some time off work to get her to doctor's appointments and such, but I'm thinking by the end of next week she should be okay on her own at home. Then maybe another week and she can go back to school? We'll see - depends on how well she can walk and do stairs. Right now she's exhausted by taking a shower. :o)

Thursday, February 09, 2006

Recovering

Jess is home and beginning the long weeks of her recovery. It was quite an adventure to get her from the car to the back door, then she still had to get through the house. That's the farthest she's walked all week.
I'll put the story of Jessi's accident and recovery here. The photo is Jessi's side of the car...
The girls were driving around in the country near Clarks, NE, which is about half an hour from here. Megan, Jessi's best friend, was driving a 2001 Ford Mustang. Jess was in the front passenger seat. Both girls had their seatbelts on. Jess said she was dozing and was about to tell Megan she wanted to go home. She opened her eyes, saw headlights, heard Megan yell, and then woke up with a pickup in her side of the car.
Her seat was moved into the middle of the car. She couldn't unbuckle her seatbelt, and it was hurting her to have it on, so the driver of the pickup cut it off of her with a pocket knife. She didn't think she was hurt, so she crawled out the driver's side window. It became apparent she was not okay, so she laid down in the road ditch.
The guys in the pickup called 911 and the sheriff's department was dispatched. Megan and Jessi couldn't find their cell phones, so they borrowed his to call us. My phone rang at 1:22 a.m. - I got out of bed and could hear the phone ringing in the kitchen. I couldn't find it in the dark, and by the time I turned on the light and found the phone, Jess was on the answering machine, begging me to pick up, they'd "been hit". Greg heard that and immediately started getting dressed.
I asked her if she was okay and she said no, but she couldn't tell me how she was hurt, just that she was. She said the sheriff and ambulance were on the way. I asked where they were and she was asking the other people there, so I just had her give the phone to someone who was not hurt. The guy told me where they were, and that the Merrick County Sheriff's department was on the way. I told him not to let her move and we were on our way.
She told me later that the guys had covered her in their winter coats to keep her warm. (No one else was hurt, though a few days later Megan was found to have some cracked ribs.)
I called the sheriff's department to confirm their location. That's when I found out they had not dispatched an ambulance. I told her that Jessi said she was hurt, so the dispatcher got the ambulance going immediately.
On the way to the accident, I called the sheriff's office again to see if they had word on how badly Jess was hurt. The dispatcher didn't know, but radioed the scene to see if we should go there, or meet them at the hospital. They said we should just go to Central City to the hospital.
We got there about 10 minutes before they did - a long wait, believe me! They brought Jess in wrapped in a huge sleeping bag-type of blanket, with a neck collar, on a back board, and with an oxygen mask on. All I could see of her were her hands folded on top.
They got her unwrapped and moved to the table, then I was able to stand by her. She saw me and said, "Hi honey!". I started to cry, of course. She told me "don't cry" and I told her that when she sees her child in a neck collar on a backboard, she'll cry, too.
She had a great deal of pain in her abdomen, so they did x-rays. That's when they found the pelvic fractures. They told us they had to send her on to Grand Island since that was serious and they didn't have an orthopedic doctor at Central City. Dr. Schneider, the trauma surgeon at GI ordered an abdominal CT scan before she left CC, so if necessary, he could have a trauma team assembled when she got there. I watched the CT - of course I couldn't see anything wrong, but I recognized organs and it was fascinating to watch.
We followed the ambulance to GI and waited in the ER emergency room while they assessed her condition and did labs. We finally got to go be with her for a few minutes before they took her to do a head and neck CT and then a cystogram to check her bladder since the CT had show some damage. That showed a hole in a place where they had to do surgery. The doctor said the force of the impact is what caused that and the laceration of her spleen.
She eventually went to surgery to repair her bladder. By then, Nick and Greg's family was there with us. Bobbi and Kurt came when they got Tonita's message, and Jackie joined us just about the time Jess got out of surgery. (THANKS, GUYS!!)
She has a 6 or 7 inch long incision, but it looks like it's not going to be a bad scar. They told her it looks like she had a C-section. She will have a catheter until next week when they will do another cystogram to check for leakage in the bladder. If all is well, they will remove the catheter.
The pelvic fractures put her in the orthopedic ward at the hospital. (Joint camp - where all the knee and hip replacement patients are.) On Monday they started Physical therapy to get her out of bed the first time. I wasn't there when they did that. Nanny said it was rough, but the PT was awesome. PT continued twice a day, doing leg exercises and then getting her out of bed and using a walker to creep into the hall and back. Yesterday they had her climb their portable staircase, before she could go home.
She also has a little device she has to suck air through to help her expand her lungs and prevent pnuemonia. She has to do this about 1,000 times a day (just kidding, but it is a lot!). And we have to push fluids now that her IV is out. I have to keep track of her "output" and take that back to the urologist next week. Fun.
I contacted Jessi's college advisor about classes. She said to just call next week and let her know when she's ready to do some work at home and she'd get some assignments sent. I don't know how her lab classes will be made up or if she'll need to drop them and try again next semester. We'll find out next time we talk to the advisor. It will be several weeks before she can return to campus.
That's about it in a nutshell. I'll keep you posted as her recovery continues.