January 2, 2010 - 1 Year Today

It's hard for me to fathom it's been one year since the day that changed Jerry's and all of our lives, forever. What a year it's been full of emotional highs and lows, great strides toward recovery, much progress and some set backs. We are treating today like any other day, it doesn't have to be a negative reminder of a tragic accident, it is what we make it. But if I'm being honest I feel a little sad that Jerry hasn't regained more mobility. We knew the first year would be crucial and the most mobility he would regain would be in the first year. So I am sad that we have reached the 1 year mark and Jerry isn't as far along as we had hoped. That being said there is so much to be grateful for and just because we've reached the one year mark we have not given up hope, this is NOT as good as it gets. God has blessed us in so many ways, we continue to pray that He will deliver Jerry and restore him to health. Matthew 19:26 "With man this is impossible, but with God all things are possible." The summer staff kids came to visit from Fresno and other places and spent the afternoon and evening with Jerry. He enjoyed seeing them and hanging out and it was a wonderful distraction.

December was very busy preparing for Christmas, continuing therapy and Dennis still working on the house. Jerry enjoyed doing all his shopping online and would get excited when one of his packages would arrive. Jerry wasn't sure who was supposed to get which package and didn't want anyone opening them before Christmas so as not to spoil the surprise. So he made up a game for Christmas morning, each person would grab one of the packages from him then we all opened them at the same time. We then had to decide if the gift we opened belonged to us or someone else. We would exchange the gift with the family member we believed had our gift and Jerry would say how many were right. The exchanging went on until we each had the gift Jerry intended for us, it was something new and fun. Christmas eve we normally drive around and deliver homemade cookies to all of our friends, it's been our tradition for years. It was a little harder this year particularly for Jerry, every pot hole and bump in the road causes him to bounce in his chair and can be very uncomfortable. Not to mention all six of us don't fit in the van as well as we fit in the Suburban. However we pulled it off delivering about 27 cookie packages and even made it to the evening church service. It was good! Sorry Trish we didn't make it up to Bonny Doon :-( next year we'll get an earlier start and one way or another your gettin cookies.

Jerry has enjoyed having his friends home from college he's gone to a party and the movies. The boys also came to the house twice for a LAN party, they network all their computers together and play video games until 2:00 am. It's so great for him to get together with his friends and just be one of the guys again. He loves to have them home but it's hard on him when they go back to school, partly because he misses hanging out with them and partly sad because he's not headed back to school.

Speaking of computers we learned another lesson the hard way. Jerry has a fan that his laptop sits on top of that sucks the heat and blows it out the side. Jerry wanted to put his lap top on his lap so I set it on top of a pillow on his lap. I didn't think there would be a heating problem because the fan lifts the laptop up about 2 inches so air can circulate underneath. Unfortunately Jerry's hand was next to the hot air exhaust blowing out the side. His hand was slowly burning for about 2 hours and he couldn't feel it. The doctor indicated it was second to third degree burns on the V between the thumb and first finger, he had some pretty nasty blisters, they are finally starting to heal.

New years eve was a blast, we had some friends over and played a game and hung out. Unfortunately Josh and Janea were not with us because they had previous plans. It was a last minute party at our house, we were invited to Kris and Nana's party but we were not able to make it so they brought the party to us. Thanks guys! Jessica and Mitch made a balloon drop in the living room with confetti and balloons and decorated for the party. We played a game called "the game of things" ....it was so much fun a must have party game. We were so loud at midnight we could have woke the dead.

Dennis has finished the tile in the bathroom/shower room, he did the last of the grout today. I'm so excited all we have to do now is wait 3 days to seal the grout, then put in the jacuzzi tub and fixtures and a little pluming. We should be able to get Jerry in the tub in about a week. I see the light at the end of the tunnel. Dennis has worked so hard the last 10 months, he deserves a nice long vacation when he's done. When it's all done and cleaned up I'll post pictures.

Well I started this post at 11:00 this morning and have left and come back to it a few times through out the day. It's now 2:00 am and I'm on duty at 4:30 am so time for me to get some shut eye. Thank you all for caring, for the prayers, support and love.

Good night,
Katie

Monday - Nov 30

I hope everyone had a wonderful Thanksgiving! This year Thanksgiving was different for us in more ways than one. Most holidays we drive three hours to Sacramento to my moms house, along with my brother and his family, nieces and nephews, great grand parents etc, that tradition has changed. All of my family jumped the sinking ship (Calif) and moved to Washington. I missed the family and the tradition but I gotta say I didn't miss the drive. We had many invites however we opted to stay home this year. I spent Wednesday evening cooking after getting home from Pleasanton. It was nice to have most everything done by Thursday so we could just enjoy the day. Dennis' brother and nephew were going to come for the day however unforeseen circumstances prevented it. We had some friends over, it was a very nice day, watching football and visiting.

Jerry has been passionate about football this year primarily because he, Dennis and I are in a fantasy football league. Jerry looks forward to watching football on Sundays and spends time planning his team players and studying information to enable him to make the best decisions regarding his team. Jerry was in fourth place in league however he was so stoked to beat Rob who is in first place, sorry Rob. It's wonderful to see him get excited about something, who would have thought that football would be the thing to offer him an escape from his reality, even if it's only for a few hours. Go Niners!

There is so much that I'm thankful for, first and foremost my son's life. Even though Jerry's body is different his mind is the same. I'm thankful that Jerry didn't suffer brain damage, I'm thankful that his level of injury was not higher then C4. I'm thankful for the health and well being of my family. I'm thankful that God gives us strength to endure.

I'm excited to share with you that Jerry's arms are getting stronger. Two weeks ago Jerry was finally able to drive his wheelchair with the (hand) joystick, Jerry has not used the chin drive since. It is far more difficult for him to use the joystick and takes a great amount of effort, he does get fatigued if he has far to go but for the most part he can handle the chair with great precision. I believe the FES hand cycle has been pivotal in Jerry regaining strength in his arms. Unfortunately our time to use the FES hand bike may be drawing to an end along with Jerry's PT and OT sessions at Dominican Rehab. Jerry's therapist is preparing the request for the next 90 day session and believes it will likely be the last that will get authorized.

Dennis has finally started tiling the new bathroom, it was an overwhelming job picking out tile and planning the pattern, I'm so glad to have that part done. We are so close now to getting the bathroom done so Jerry can take a real shower or bath. Eleven months of sponge baths has gotten very old it's just not the same as a real shower or bath.

Thank you for the support, please continue to pray for the restoration of Jerry's spinal cord and for guidance with going to China for stem cell surgery.

Much love,
Katie

Thursday - Nov 5

Winters on it's way and already I don't like it. It's been cold in the mornings and evenings but not to bad in the day. We've had one good storm so far with 11 1/2 inches of rain in Boulder Creek. Ironically I like a good storm, I just hate dreary, overcast, drizzly, cold days. I'm not a big fan of the time change either, it was dark before we left SCI-FIT in Pleasanton yesterday, it makes me tired driving home in the dark. One last complaint, the TVs on but the channel is off the air so they play music, Christmas music. Are you kidding me, Christmas already we haven't even had Thanksgiving yet, Costco's had their Christmas stuff out for at least two weeks. OK, I got all that out of the way, I'm done complaining.

We all had a night out of enjoyment Friday before Halloween, Dennis and I went to a Murder Mystery Dinner at a friends house. The scene was 1929, my character was a socialite dressed in a flapper dress, fish nets and boa. Dennis' character was a pro baseball player, that was an easy costume to come up with. Jessica played a server and served us a delicious dinner (chicken parmasian). We had a wonderful time and got home pretty late. Jerry went to a costume party with some friends, Luke was home from college, Kiki and Natani. Jerry was a prisoner in an electric chair, I know kinda morbid right, at least he's able to have a sense of humor. Jerry got home really late close to 4:00 am but he said he had a lot of fun. The person having the party Sean and his landlord built a ramp so Jerry could get in the house. Thanks guys for making it easy for Jerry to be involved in a fun night out.

Not much change physically with Jer, he's still struggling with the nausea. Jerry had a CT scan which didn't get to the root cause of anything. The CT scan did show that he has two small stones, one in each Kidney however the doctor feels that they are so small they aren't causing any problem. We continue to go to therapy four days a week, Jerry's body is staying strong and he seems to be moving his arms more. Jerry is so close to being able to control his wheelchair with the joy stick as opposed to the chin drive, he can pull back and go left and right he just can't push forward yet. It will be a glorious day when he is able to use the joy stick.

I've been doing stem cell research for some time now which can be very overwhelming. We are looking to go over seas for Jerry to have stem cell surgery. China, India and Portugal are all more advanced in this area then we are here in the States. Stem cell therapy has not been perfected to the point of curing spinal cord injury however most patients get some improvement whether it be bowel or bladder function, or the use of arms, some even have regained the ability to walk but thats a small percentage. I really am leaning toward China, I like what I'm learning. One thing I like is they use your own bone marrow cells and turn them into nerve cells as opposed to using embryonic cells. There's no moral issue when they are using your own cells. Jerry very much wants to have stem cell therapy but is concerned about the cost. He worries we won't have the money to do it or if we do come up with the funds he's concerned about spending all that money on something that may not work. My feeling is we will come up with the money one way or another through fund raising efforts, it's a small price to pay for the hope that it could help him walk again. Even if he could just regain bowel and bladder and the use of his arms that would be HUGE. I'll keep you posted about my research.

The transmission on Janea's car is going out, I've been on craigs list and vehics.com looking for a car for her. I really hate car shopping it's so time consuming. I miss the days when a couple thousand dollars would get you a pretty decent car. It' seems like anything less then $3,000 is a piece of doodoo. The hunt goes on....

I better get moving, I have to get Jerry ready for therapy. Jerry is doing the arm cycle at Dominican Rehab today, that's one of my favorite therapies, I feel he gets stronger each time he does the arm cycle.

Have a wonderful day,

Katie

Saturday - Oct 18

I've feared the swine flu and prayed it would not hit our home, this week my fear came to be, Dennis was diagnosed with the swine flu. We quarantined him to the bedroom with a mask and gloves. I was very worried that Jerry would catch the bug, and it would spread through our house. I was like a crazy woman disinfecting everything in sight, three different times. Our whole family was treated with Tamiflu and so far no one else has gotten sick. We are scheduled to get vaccinated on Monday.

Things have been going much the same, Jerry is still having nausea in the morning and early afternoon. Jerry is scheduled for a CT Scan on the 26th, they'll be looking for any kind of stones bladder, kidney, etc. He's had two ultrasounds which came back normal, I'm told the CT Scan is supposed to be more sensitive. It sounds weird but I hope they find something, at least if the find stones you know what your dealing with and how to treat it. The whole looking for the needle in the haystack thing is getting old. I think we've tried every medication available, every homeopathic remedy and ran every test available. We're running out of options and really need to get to the root of the problem.

I put together a video of some of the exercises Jerry does at SCI-FIT. It's really poor quality because I took it with my phone but it gives you an idea of some of the things he does there.



I hope everyone has a wonderful week, stay well.

God bless,
Katie

Friday - Oct 9

I can't believe we're 9 months post injury, the time has gone so quickly. I really thought at 6 months things were going to start waking up in Jerry's body. I thought Jerry would be further along in his mobility, certainly at 9 months I expected a greater return. The closer we get to the one year mark the scarier it becomes because progress slows after 1 year. The greatest return is in the first year, you can continue to get return of some mobility after the first year but at a much slower rate. I have to keep reminding myself of all the improvements Jerry has made over the last 9 months, he really has come a long way. Although I wish he were closer to his goal of walking I am grateful for the movements that Jerry does have. Jerry's arms continue to get stronger by using the FES hand bike at Dominican Rehab. I wish he could use the hand bike 3 to 4 times per week, once a week slows progress in my opinion. I'm working on getting an FES Bike for our house which may or may not be successful as it is a very costly piece of equipment, $20,000. Jerry can now lift both arms and give a little wave, I'll have to post a video. Jerry has trace initiation in his left tricep but it's not strong enough to be useful at this point. If we could get Jerry's triceps to fire he could get strong enough to use a joystick control for his wheel chair and get rid of the chin drive, that would be sweet.

Life remains busy, Mondays are doctor appointment/errands day. Tue through Fri are therapy days, Sat & Sun for Jerry are chill/recoup days. For me Sat & Sun is get caught up on house cleaning, paper work, laundry, bills, grocery shop, etc. Dennis continues to work five days a week at his job and work on the weekends on the house. We are getting oh so close, I can't wait to get the bathroom done. Nine months of sponge baths for Jerry has taken it's toll on his skin, it's just not the same as a nice long shower or bath. Dennis took a break from the bathroom to get the roof put on since the rain's are headed our way, I'm glad to have that done. Dennis also poured the concrete pad for the AC unit. Although the AC is no longer priority at this point, heat is, they go hand in hand as they use the same ducting and at this point there is no heat in Jerry's room and it gets cold. We are using a little portable heater for his room which is working out OK but not a long term solution.

I think I may have mentioned in a previous post that Jerry was appointed by our district supervisor Mark Stone to the Commission on Disabilities. Jerry is a district 5 commissioner for the COD. Yesterday was the annual planning retreat for projects for the next year. Incidentally my cat Tina was also scheduled to be spayed as well as FES hand bike at Dominican for Jerry, we can't miss that. The plan was to drop Jerry at the retreat, stay a few minutes to get Jerry settled then run Tina to Scotts Valley to drop her at the vet and return to the retreat. Things just did not go well, amazingly we were able to get out of the house by 9:40 am, we had a 10 minute drive to Ben Lomond and everything seemed to be working out well. The street we were supposed to turn on was right off hwy9 in Ben Lomond. This is were things went a rye, we couldn't find the street, we drove all the way to Felton and did not see the street, turned around drove back to BL. Again we didn't find the street turned around drove all the way to Felton again and back to BL. Turns out we were misinformed the street was in Brookdale, at any rate we were 25 minutes late to the retreat, AWKWARD. It's not like you can sneak in unnoticed. Needless to say we missed the appointment for Tina, I had to leave the retreat and take Tina home. We had to leave the retreat early to make it to Jerry's FES appointment, which again was awkward disrupting the meeting to leave early. Jerry was not feeling well because he had been cold all morning and all his muscles had clinched up in his shoulders and neck, however he wanted to do FES. After getting Jerry all hooked up which takes about 20 minutes the bike began malfunctioning. We left feeling a little disappointed and headed to the pharmacy to pick a prescription that was droped off almost 2 weeks ago. This was our third visit to the pharmacy to pick up this script, wouldn't ya know they still don't have it. It was one of those days, just kinda wierd. Today was better but I'm so glad it's Friday, even though it was a long day getting down to Pleasonton it's nice to have the weekend to look forward to.

Please keep the healing prayers coming, we're still waitin on the miracle.

Much love,
Katie

Thank You!

The pizza party was a huge success last night, it was so great seeing the community support. Thank you to JR Curtis (lacrosse) & Doug Morris (football) for planning and organizing the event, you guys ROCK! We appreciate the time you took from your busy schedules to put on this fund raiser to benefit Jerry and Allie. The Redwood Pizzeria was so gracious to host the event, not to mention they have fabulous pizza, I love the organic pizza crust, hmmm. It was my understanding the pizzeria ran out of pizza and it was the most pizza they've ever sold. Thank you again and again to the entire community for supporting our kids.

Much love,

Katie

Big Pizza Fundraiser Coming Your Way

The San Lorenzo Valley High School football and lacrosse teams are hosting a Pizza Night fund raiser for Jerry and Allie. Thanks guys, you guys ROCK!

When: Tuesday September 29th
Time: 5:00 - 8:00 pm
Where: Redwood Pizzeria
6205 Hwy 9 ♥ Felton

Call in Orders Early 335-1500

You can check out menu options here: http://www.redwoodpizza.com/mainindex.html

Join us for Dinner at the Redwood Pizzeria, come hungry, order early. I'm told it's best to call your pizza in early to avoid a long wait. A portion of the proceeds from all sales will be split to benefit Jerry and Allie. Hope to see ya there!