Therapy, Y’all! Austin’s Recovery Continues

WooHoo!

Physical therapy did an evaluation with Austin today, and they helped him to walk 20 excruciating steps! He did it! I’m so proud of him!

Especially considering that they have not walked any steps before now. Since were talking about rehab, they got in right quick and did the whole nine yards to have something on his chart.

OT (occupational) worked with Austin too. These therapists are really good and doing little things is giving Austin confidence that he can do more for himself.

Someone noticed yesterday his neck brace was off. (Like the one pictured)

Yea and no.

They’ve cleared for it to be off in bed, and want it on when up. He does have a chipped T1, and this offered some support and reminds him to to get too wild with his movement. As if that was a problem. It presses into his back in the bed, and was bugging him.

Wednesday Austin just did better overall. Ate a smidgen more, does more for himself in the bed as far as movement, and seemed to be improving.

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He’s prone to despair at times. He’s frustrated with being pinned down, and not being able to get out of the bed. Yes, they walked him, but that was him basically being dragged along while he learned how to scoot/move his broken leg. It’ll get better.

I tried a couple things for distraction. Austin came up either more bed exercised, we tried a couple games. One was ok, but ended up in some frustration. Austin’s arm/hand limitations make it a little more challenging. We discovered you can’t do Uno All Wild cards with just two people. It’s pointless. I should have stuck to the regular one. 🤷‍♀️

We tried a Rubick’s challenge slide game that was ok. We didn’t get much into it, I’m afraid. We ended up with a western show, because it beats the endless phone scrolling.

Thursday Morning

We are waiting for the MRI.

Scratch that.

I just came to Austin’s room and he did have the MRI this morning. We are now awaiting word on that. Unofficially, he was told something like, “Man, your arm is really messed up. Everything’s a jumbled up mess in there.” I’ll translate that to doctor jargon after the trauma team comes by to interpret for us. 😉

We also just found out today that Austin was denied the rehab center we’d decided on (where he has friends in high places), because he’s not mobile enough. 😞 yeah–refer to the dragging him along bit. They must have mentioned the dragging part.

So it looks like Austin will probably go to one of the rehab centers here in Knoxville. I’ve heard excellent things about several of them. So we will be looking in another direction.

That’s good and bad for me personally. I’m happy to have everything close by where I’ve gotten used to it, but I do miss being at home with the rest of my family, who’ve been on autopilot for nine days. I think once Austin’s in rehab I’ll be back and forth more.

Austin’s ready–ready to move to the next step. He’s motivated, even though he has some limitations.

Let’s keep praying for full recovery. For patience and calm nerves.

Thank you for following along. It means a lot to our whole family!