Big news: Mom went home Friday! I went to visit her yesterday, Saturday, and she’s doing well. She’ll still need physical therapy for a while and she’s a little shaky, but her voice is still sounding good and she’s feeling much better.
I spent a couple of hours with Mom yesterday, Saturday the 22nd. She looks and sounds a lot better. The bump on her head is really starting to go down, and when I got to the Manor she had the soft collar on so it was easier for her to talk, and her voice sounds back to normal.
She still alternates between the soft and the rigid collars, but she did tell me that she’s figured out how to wear the rigid collar more comfortably. So she’s feeling much better in general.
I personally haven’t spoken to the physical therapist, but it sounds like she’s making good progress. While I was visiting with her she got herself out of bed and over to the bathroom with minimal help; she just needed to hold my hand to navigate a narrow pass between her bed and a chair, but otherwise she walked on her own and did well, albeit slowly.
I still don’t have a time frame on when she’s expected to return home, but based on her movement yesterday I would think she’s getting close.
With respect to calling: if any of you have been hesitant to call her because you don’t want to disturb her rest, she said that she does sometimes turn her phone off when she needs to rest, and is otherwise happy to receive calls. However, I would ask this: because her recovery is taking a lot of her energy, and because she (like all of us) is still grappling with the loss of Dad, I’d ask that phone calls be kept upbeat as possible. She can use all the good news she can get at this time.
If you do call and she doesn’t answer, that means she’s likely resting which is of course a good thing.
Hello all, I spent a couple of hours with Mom on Friday and she was doing well. She had physical therapy which apparently went well. As of Friday, she still needs help walking around, so she’ll be at Oxnard Manor for a bit longer, but she is holding up well.
Also, she took her collar off for a bit while I was there. I was concerned that that was dangerous, but apparently the physical therapist said it’s ok for her to take breaks from it. She is still wearing a collar for the majority of the day.
If you talk to Mom, her voice is hard to understand, partially because of the collar and partially because her throat is still a little sore from the surgery and from having the collar on. Also, occasionally she will ramble due to the pain medication or if she’s starting to get tired.
However, her pain is being managed well and, when asked, she says she’s not in any pain.
Good evening, all. I just heard that today Mom was doing very well, was up and moving about.
She’s still tired, as one might imagine, but apparently they were able to give her a softer collar which has meant she’s able to rest more comfortably. So that’s a really big help.
Hello all, sorry for the delay in updates. I went to visit Mom last Saturday, the 8th. I had only planned to stay for a short time since she really needs her rest; however, when I got there she was quite chatty and it was clear that she wanted to talk.
So we talked for the better part of an hour, during which she sat up on the edge of the bed, with minimal help from me, and ate her lunch. Eventually the nurses came in and were having a conversation with Mom’s roommate, which made it a little hard for me to hear Mom since her voice is still a little soft, and obstructed by the collar. So she suggested that I sing a little music. (I had brought Dad’s old ukulele with me, thinking that if I sang it might help her sleep.)
So I sang to her for a bit, and she did in fact doze. She is having some strange dreams due to the pain medications, so she sleeps fitfully, and occasionally would talk to me, although it was clear that she was half asleep and so she wasn’t really addressing me. (At one point she was adamant that Aubrey had been in the room, walking around in a bathrobe, which I can assure you had not been the case!)
Oxnard Manor doesn’t have physical therapy on the weekends, so I can’t provide any firsthand feedback on that, although I understand that while she is progressing well, she (so I am told) is not always the most cooperative patient, which slows down the therapy a bit.
However, so far as I can tell, her recovery is coming along well, albeit a bit slow. In fact, she had showered Saturday morning and I was happy to sincerely compliment her; her hair looked very nice. So it seems that all is moving along well at this point.
I’ll continue to update as there is news to report and, as always, questions welcome. Blessings.
I just spoke with Warren; he and Kathleen went to visit Mom earlier today and she continues to make rapid progress.
The bump on her head continues to shrink, and they’ve been giving her some oxygen which seems to be actually helping her voice (that’s a secondary benefit, I imagine, but welcome nonetheless).
She’s also very alert and was asking for updates on the news, etc. and making relevant conversation with Kathleen and Warren. (This is primarily noteworthy because pain medications can often make people a little prone to ramble or go off on tangents or speak nonsense, so this is further confirmation that her pain is being managed well and doesn’t seem to be disruptive at all.)
As Ted recently reported, her physical therapy is progressing well; she will likely be at the Manor for another week or two.
The latest report is that mom has settled in well at the care facility and that she’s doing quite well. The collar/neck brace makes it a little difficult for her to talk so her voice is hard to understand. The collar also makes it difficult to sleep, so she’s pretty drowsy; so we’re trying to keep visits brief so that she can rest as much as possible.
She’ll start back on physical therapy on Monday, but all signs continue to be positive and that she should recover quite well.
John here- I spent several hours with Mom yesterday, Friday the 31st.
Her surgery went well. She now has a screw in one of her vertebrae. This is a fairly routine procedure and the doctors were pleased with how it went, and how her bones looked overall. It will take several weeks to heal, however, so she has a neck brace on and will probably have it for the next 4 to 6 weeks.
Additionally, she has a substantial lump above her left eye, known as a hematoma. It looks really bad if you happen to see her, and it’s uncomfortable for her, but it’s not serious and it’s going to heal on its own. (They said that it’s better to let it heal by itself because that will reduce any scarring afterwards.)
Mom was discharged from Community Memorial Hospital last night and has been moved to Oxnard Manor so she can receive physical therapy. I don’t yet know how long she will be there, but it’s basically until she can get up and about by herself; because her surgery was on her neck, her stability and strength will take a little while to return. However, her first sessions of PT went well.
She will likely be using a walker when she gets home for a bit, and from there we strongly suspect she will use a cane to help with her stability.
At this point, it doesn’t seem that this injury will leave any long-term impact, and all signs indicate that Mom will make a full and (relatively) quick recovery. As with the cane, however, she’ll need to modify some habits to protect against future falls.
I think that’s all for now. Please subscribe to these posts to get future updates in your email and, as always, contact John if you have further questions. Thank you all.