The White Board!

I tried again this morning with the alphabet chart and a big "YES" and a big "NO" and still didn't get anywhere. On my way home from Santa Monica this afternoon, I stopped at Staples and got a small 12x18 inch white board and took that in during my evening visit. It took a while to get going, and we did this in conjunction with the alphabet chart and slowly built the first sentence. Every time I understood something he wrote, I would erase his illegible scratching and write it in more clearly, as an anchor (I wrote most of what you see here, after erasing Dad's first draft). When we finally got the first sentence out, and confirmed with him that he was worried about the way they flip him over, we had successfully communicated. At that point, thankfully, the doctor came in and saw what we were doing. It was immensely useful for Dad to see that we had successfully communicated his concern, and that someone in authority understood. The second part ("not P.T.") was in response to what the doctor said. He thought Dad's concern was about the physical therapy (I didn't even know that had started), but after some back and forth we determined that it was the person who comes in to clean him up. Once the doctor and I repeated back to him what he was trying to communicate, he gave the OK sign with his hand. Whew!!! Now each day I can go back in and ask him if it has gotten better.

Now I call your attention to the next sentence, which he wrote after we concluded the discussion about being flipped over. It says "Isn't she pretty". Then he pointed to the bed next to his. He was talking about the daughter of the woman in the next bed. Oh my God!! My father is back!!! He's making jokes, he's complaining, he likes the woman sitting at the next bed, he's ok!!!

The next part makes no sense: we got as far as "last night I was in Europe with Deb". Maybe it was a dream, maybe he's hallucinating, I don't care.

The medical news: the antibiotic seems to be working on the pneumonia and a UTI. His fever is down. They are concerned about his heart rate, which shoots up sometimes. They have begun physical therapy. The hard collar will be on for six weeks, and they will probably leave the tracheotomy hole for that time. They can't put a time frame on getting him out of the ICU -- it depends on how he responds to physical therapy.

I told him Bob had been to his house today, and would be coming for a visit on Friday. That's great -- I think this is the perfect time for him to start seeing someone other than me. Until he gets out of the ICU, we have to respect the rule against non-family members, but when he gets out to the main hospital ward he can have visitors. In the meantime, since he's alert and remembering things from visit to visit, please feel free to send cards to me, and I will take them in. Here's my address:

Deborah Testa
3863 Berry Court
Studio City, CA 91604

To all of you who have left comments about the value of this blog, I have to say: it's a two-way street. Reading your comments -- all of them, no matter what they way -- has made this whole experience much more tolerable. I can't thank you enough, every last one of you. And I'm so excited to hear that the family has two fiddlers now! Maybe Caitlin and I can play Dad a duet soon.

There's probably a lot more to say, but I have to go rest now: too much excitement for one day.