Wednesday, February 22, 2006

Jan had an angyogram

Today could have been just another day in Jan's recovery. We could have celerated one less day for Jan's stay at the hospital. But today the neurologists decided to do an angyogram(?) on Jan. The procedure is frightening but in the opinion of the doctors is low risk. She had some dye injected into her blood stream so they could get a picture of the blood vesels in her brain. The procedure was successful, they had a good view of her brain, what was alarming from what they saw is that there is vaso-constriction (some narroing of the blood vesels) that could cause another series of strokes.

Jan is still in the woods, in our enthusiasm we tend to forget that the doctors did mentioned at the beginning that the difficult stage would be the first 15 to 20 days.

She came back a exhausted and somehow depressed and irritable. When I asked her if she wanted to switch places with me, she just ignored me.

She is using her glasses, which she puts on by herself. I showed her some pictures, for a while, she looked at them carefully. The pictures are familiar faces and familiar places. She smiled at some of them. She was flipping the pages by herself. I tried speaking with her using ASL. She saw my signs but refused to engage.

It is very frustating not to be able to understand what she needs. I imagine it is like being in solitary confinment, both sides unable to communicate with the other.

She is also listening to music. She has a CD player and earphones which she puts on by herself. She is becoming very independent! However, in this situation all this signs of independence and progress can mean nothing when a complication arises.

We need a double dose of support. Thanks you for responding to our petitions so generously.

We'll keep you posted, hopefully with more cheerful news about this extraodinary journey Jan is taking. Remember that she is still very ill.

-Fede

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