Going Well, Getting Stronger

Things are going well. Janette continues to gain strength. Last night she slept all the way through with very little coughing. We could see the difference in her face this morning. She insists on doing more and more by herself and is highly motivated to get out of that wheelchair and do everything on her own. Well, I'm sure she's still willing to let me shop and clean.

Her swallowing also improves. She deeply longs just to drink some water. Oh, right: her ability to swallow worsened in the hospital. Why? I don't know. We certainly have enough possible reasons to choose from. So, Janette needed and needs all her food pureed and all her liquids thickened to the consistency of honey. All she wants right now is a drink of plain, unthickened water. This evening we tried 4oz of orange juice half as thick as usual. I made her promise to concentrate intently on swallowing, keep her chin down the whole time, sip slowly, don't try to talk, and so on. She obeyed all the rules and didn't choke or cough once. Two hours later she successfully did it all again.

If she would eat and drink this way all the time, we would rarely have problems and she would get a lot more liquids inside her. But anyone who knows my mother well or knows other members of her family knows this is genetically impossible--the slow, careful, not talking or doing other things at the same time part.

Janette seems to be deeply committed to recovering from her seizures and ventilator traumas. She has not given up, though she realizes the cancer is "worse" than she thought. I don't talk with her about her emotional state right now and she is surrounded by her siblings when she is not sleeping.

She still tires easily, though less so, and is still sleeping much. I think all the sleeping is good. I think we were both very sleep deprived from 5 (6? I lost track) days in the hospital. How can anyone heal in that environment? Not die, yes. Recover, yes. But heal? I don't know. All our hospital nurses and techs were wonderful. It's just so noisy in there with so many interruptions!

We still have consistent care from hospice. If she keeps getting better, I'm sure that will change. I also have all my Aunts and Uncle and my sister helping me right now, wanting to do all the cooking and cleaning up after themselves and insisting that I rest and recover. I'm still tired, but much better. I feel the mental, physical and emotional load lifted somewhat from my shoulders. Thank you, everyone! Aunt Eliska was also carrying this weight with me. I wonder if she is feeling eased or if she is still shouldering as much as she was before. She seems to be doing more physical work. I'm staying home with Janette and she's running everyone around town and back and forth to the airport.

I also really like having all of them here, all together, minus Uncle Terry and, of course, Aunt Sis and Uncle Carroll. I don't get to be with them as often as you all do over there. This is a wonderful treat for me.

And I know that many friends of Janette are reading this, too. We've had a couple of neighbors stop by for a few minutes. She's so often sleeping or tired from talking with her siblings that more than half the time, we turn people away at the door. She not quite ready for visitors. Let's let her spend her strength healing and recovering. Visits beyond 2 minutes seem to wipe her out. With her family, she can just tune them out or listen to them talk among themselves. When friends stop by, she will put all her energy and focus on visiting with you.