It's a Beautiful Day

It's Friday and for once this week, Dave and I have a morning off from having to be somewhere for a Dr's appt or physical therapy. It's a nice break, in fact we are laying around in our jammies, watching Ellen on TV...laughter therapy is the best!! Thank God for people who make us laugh!

Dave is really doing so well. The brain is a miraculous thing...how it can find new pathways to accomplish things that damaged areas can no longer do. For those of you who don't know, Dave also had a stroke several weeks into his hospitalization for the heart attack. Somehow, a small piece must have broken off of the clot that had formed in Dave's heart, and travelled to his brain. I noticed a change in DAve's vision and notified the DRs who did a CAT scan and found the stroke damage in his brain.

Please don't feel upset if this is the first that you have heard this news...DAve is doing great! As Sarah says, the stroke must have activated her Dad's "happy brain" and he is very upbeat and even his humour has improved...his joke telling ability is better too!!

Sure, there are times when he is tired and frustrated...it is very frustrating for him to have me chastise him for going down the stairs to the basement and doing things that he shouldn't take the risk of doing. It is important that DAve not have any falls or serious bumps due to all of the blood thinners he is on, so I have to "reign him in" occasionally from doing something that he thinks he can do, but perhaps shouldn't risk.

Last night, when giving him a hug, I felt a big lump on his side that hadn't been there before. on removing his shirt, I found a egg size lump with a bruise color on top - a hematoma I guess - I called the Dr., he said not to worry as long as it didn't enlarge, and we seem okay this am, but this is the sort of thing we have to be on top of. Also, for those of you who have never had a loved one on blood thinners, he has to have his blood drawn twice weekly to check his "INR" levels to make sure they are in an acceptable range - with this monitoring, he is told how to adjust his cumidin levels daily. I admit that the drugs and dosages can be confusing and wonder how the elderly or alone do this without help or a clear mind...I have already had to double and triple check the weekly pill holder to see if I had done it right. He takes 10 pills each am, and several at night...thank goodness for his iron stomach...I get sick to my stomach with one vitamin!!

When we go to the physical therapy clinic in Ann ARbor, it is a daily reminder of how fortunate we are and how much others less fortunate are dealing with. Physical therapists are able to improve the lives of many people, and I wish that I had chosen an education that had given me the skills...perhaps I will still choose to do something such as this before I am too old to help. Maybe part of God's plan is to remind me of my desire to help others and to help me find out how I can best do that. There are so many people who need our encoragement...Dave is fortunate in that he has family and friends who love him...what about all of those people who aren't so blessed?

Another gift that has come out of the ordeal of the last two months is that Dave has learned that he really is loved for who he is...I don't think that he realised it before. The emails, phone calls, cards and prayers have done so much for him and for me, not in the least has been the visible fact that they have shown Dave that he is loved by the people he has daily contact with. I think that he thought he was invisible in many ways or that he hadn't made many friends...it is obvious that he was wrong and that good, kind, genuine people like DAve are noticed...that is reassuring to all of us , especially when we start to believe that life doesn't reward good people...it does, just not perhaps in the ways that we expect.

I like to get up in the early morning , turn on the gas fireplace, get a cup of coffee while Dave sleeps, and watch the daylight come. We live in downtown Northville and at that time of Day it is still quiet. Before long, the sun starts to come up and all of the birds start to chatter...we are next to a wall of ivy vines that cover the building next to us, and it is often full of birds in the morning and early evening. They are like an alarm clock going off! There are two huge old maple trees behind our house and they litterally light up when the early sun hits their leaves which are bright yellow fall colors - they still haven't fallen to the ground. I hope that they can hold on a bit longer before the dull days of late November come.

We are looking forward to a visit from Sarah this weekend. She is driving up from Chicago and taking a long weekend to be with us. I think that the weather is supposed to be nice and maybe we will hit the cider mill here in downtown Northville.

Dave and I hope that you are having a wonderful autumn and that every day brings you joy.Feel free to call us anytime - 248-505-7277, or to visit. He is definitely up to it, and we often go out for lunch or dinner if I'm tired of cooking. I have never been particularly good at being home full time, so I have been dragging Dave around on errands etc, and he has been very good about putting up with it. I think that he gets tired of being housebound too.

Love to all,
Melody and Dave