Evening Update

This afternoon TJ was put into a chair with a lift and really seemed to enjoy it. He also was able to turn himself in bed a bit. While he was sitting some friends were in with photos of a trip to China together. When they left he croaked, "I love you, too" in response to their "we love you!" Then the speech therapist walked in and got nothing! I think it is the blue isolation gowns that make him highly suspicious. He is using his tongue and mouth more and swallowed after a couple ice chips so a swallowing study with fluoroscopy will be scheduled for tomorrow morning to see if the feeding tube can be removed and some kind of food started.

His white blood count is down a little (don't remember the number), temps have been good, and oxygen saturation has been good without being on oxygen. He has a productive cough with a lot of thick junk and the nurse deep suctioned a couple of times to help clear it since he is not quite getting it up and out on his own.

The beard came off because it was looking rather ragged and it would not be too much of a physical stressor to shave. I tried trimming it last week with bad results! When we moved out of the hospital apartment last week we used a shopping cart and had about 15 shopping bags. I told the guys that if TJ were pushing it with how his beard looked someone would put him in a shelter!

So give thanks for the progress, and prayers that it continues!

Brief Note on Security

I should have mentioned this earlier, or at least made it clear. We are only worried about using TJ's first name on the blog. Some of you have, and right now we're not worried for two reasons.

First, there are other, much more prominent places that list TJ's full name and title.

Second, I set this blog to not be indexed in search engines, so even if we posted his name, title, social security number, etc., it wouldn't come up on Google, etc. (Some of them have indexed it, but it will be removed within an acceptable time frame.)

So although nothing is bullet proof, stuff is good enough here.

Morning Update

This morning TJ was able sit up on the edge of his bed for ten minutes, and stand on his own for twenty seconds -- a pretty big deal. (The size -- literally -- tends to influence how aggresive the PT is. Small ladies won't try to stand TJ up in the event he can't do it.) And all of this without oxygen, which he is off for the time being.

They also deeply suctioned his lungs which led to a lot of coughing -- a good thing. Even after all of this his vitals are all doing pretty well. He is tired already, but he had a workout!

One of the cardiac doctors stopped in briefly to listen to the valve, which he said sounded the same as a week ago.

Finally, although this seems completely unrelated, for those of you who personally know TJ this will be shocking: his beard and mustache are gone. I haven't even seen a picture of TJ with no facial hair since before he was 19. Rumor has it he tried this over the summer while on vacation in Montana, but no evidence for this actually exists.

Good Morning

Boy are you guys good! I have never gotten over a sore throat so fast in my life! I am on my way to the hospital in just a few minutes and bringing a quote by Sir Winston Churchill to put up in TJ's room: "If you are going through hell, keep going."

MA