Revelations & Coincidences

We are revelling in relief that something troubling Linda has been revealed. So many of her doctors and the social worker who acts as a liason between the various medical teams and the patient had been telling her about getting her ready to transfer her to rehab., which will be live-in with nursing care to attend to her healing broken places while she pursues physical and occupational therapy. The rehab. may last about 3 weeks, after which she may still move onto regular rehab. if needed before going home. Now, John & I have understood this and assumed it was clear to Linda for several days. Mom seemed fearful of this transition and had been expressing a lot of worry about the possibility of leaving UAMS because she doesn't feel ready and already has such confidence in UAMS staff. However, we finally realized why she was so scared. She had it her mind that she would have to go home so soon and be an outpatient at the rehabilitation facility! She felt rushed to do things like negotiate the stairs at home before she's ready! Once she understood, she sighed with great relief! So did we!

Also, the orthopedic technician came in to change her right arm's cast to a lighter, lower profile one. He let Mom pick the color, blue, and she now has freer use of her four fingers, plus you can see her thumb poking out but still not usable for grasping. I was impressed that his handling of her bare wrist did not cause severe pain and it appears to be healing right on schedule. This man told three amazing success stories about three women who had traffic accidents with similarly tragic injuries who had also occupied Linda's room 435, and were all three now successfully rehabilitated. That gave us great encouragement, and put a big smile on Linda's face!

More great news: the tube connected to the vacuum has been removed after the most recent redressing of the skin graft, so the only tube remaining (apart from the booties air pump) is the tube inserted in her right lung. As of 7:30pm, noone had come to look at it as we had expected, but maybe tomorrow.

Ginger, the social worker, shared an interesting coincidence. She happened to grab an old copy of Arkansas Times lying around and opened it up to the article that featured Linda & John Fordyce and the Firehouse Hostel & Museum! She recognized Mom as her patient right away!

Also, a person known to John & Linda was in a gun shop in Greer's Ferry. The subject of scooters, then the accident, came up and the individual working in the shop asked when & where and it turns out the shopkeeper was the neighbor of the in-laws of the man driving the truck that ran over Linda and knew all about the accident. We have been so thankful that the driver was so alert and his attempt to avoid hitting Linda may have saved her life. She looks forward to meeting him.