5/10/15 Chuck’s Report
Happy Mother’s Day to all the Mothers out there. We spent the day at Susy and had a good BBQ dinner with us, Susy, Katie and Mark. Lorraine, Susy and Katie had their annual Mother’s Day pictures taken last week and I’ve downloaded them on my computer so will probably add some pictures from that sitting at the end of this.
I had intended to get this written this morning but just didn’t find the time to sit down and write it before we left for Susy so here it is evening already and I’m just getting started. Oh well, like I said, we had a good day today and it doesn’t hurt to write this in the evening vs the morning.
Only a couple of good things about being here this long, we really enjoy being around Susy and Katie but realize we are effecting their normal lives too. The weather is pretty good. And we feel Lorraine is getting the best medical care for her recovery. We did change her primary doctor after interviewing three others. Her new one was suggested by the neurologist Lorraine saw so that give her some weight before we even started the interview process.
Our research shows there are only about 60 certified comprehensive stoke hospitals throughout the states, hospitals and doctors that have to meet very high standards of stroke care to receive this certification. There are four here in the Bay area and all of the doctors Lorraine has been seeing are part of one of these groups. There is only one of these centers in Oregon and one in Washington for comparison. And we have given all her records and paperwork to Stanford Medical Center for review and a second opinion, they are one of the four certified hospitals in the area too.
Lorraine has been going to the speech therapist twice a week still and is still showing improvement every visit. She is also able to play the dice and card games with us much better too. Last night we played 10,000 and she was able to total the dice and keep up with the scores too, yea. She is still having trouble coming up with an answer to a direct question but that’s getting better too. All in all, she is progressing nicely, its been seven weeks since her stroke.
We have resumed doing her daily walks too, we stopped for a couple of days after her procedure because we didn’t want to pull anything loose. But she is healing well from that except for some itching as the incision heals and walking doesn’t seem to bother it.
As mentioned last week, Lorraine had the angiogram performed on May 23 and they found she has two aneurysm in the veins in her brain. She was put on the surgeon’s schedule to have one repaired and the other prepped, and a month or so later have the second one repaired.
We got a call from them and she is now scheduled to have the first procedure done this Tuesday morning, 5/12. This procedure will be done in the hospital and she will be under a general anesthesia, not just mildly sedated like last time. And she will stay in the ICU at least for one night afterwards so they can better monitor her. There are some risks associated with this of course but with all the prayers and good thoughts sent her way, we hope she doesn’t experience any issues. She is scheduled for 8:00 AM Pacific daylight savings time on Tuesday and it should last maybe two hours.
And of course, we ask for and hope everyone continues with their prayers and good thoughts for her this time too. We both believe this helps, at the very least, it doesn’t hurt!
The weather this week has been cooler than the prior two weeks, we even got some rain one morning. We normally don’t get the “San Francisco fog” down this far South but even had that a couple mornings too. But still, can’t complain too bad about the highs only getting to the upper 60s/low 70s with lots of afternoon sun shine.
Still don’t have any travel plans yet but know we won’t be traveling far or fast this year as we need to pretty much be around here for the doctors. Lorraine really wants us to make a trip back to Washington in July and August and we’ve made arrangements and have a site rented for us but even that is a maybe depending on doctor visits and her recovery.
Ok, now for some pictures.
There are about 20 more I could add but this give a good review of them.
Thanks Chuck
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