Sunday Miracles

Last night I was feeling tired enough and emotionally secure enough to actually get some sleep on the hard hospital pull-out couch.  I was so asleep, in fact, that when the X-Ray technician came in to do David’s nightly chest X-Ray I did not wake up, and he/she did not wake me up to leave the room. . .  so I (and baby #3 in utero) were both peacefully slumbering in the there when that happened.  Had to file an incident report for that one, and will get a call from radiology tomorrow to talk about what kind of exposure it caused.

In the wee hours of the morning the nurse had begun to slowly lower David’s sedative dose per the doctor’s orders.  All his numbers were staying good and he was not overly agitated unless the nurse was bothering him by cleaning him or turning him or suctioning him.  Around 7am the attending neurologist visits each patient’s room and checks up on them.  Generally the sedative is turned way down or even suspended while she is in the room so she can get the best response possible from the patient.

Any family or visitors in the room are encouraged to watch, but to stay more or less out of the way and not get involved in the doctor’s exam.  This is sometimes difficult because most of the neuro exam involves her loudly asking David to hold up two fingers, or wiggle his toes or open his eyes.  It’s really hard to stand there silently, with my heart begging and hoping and wishing for him to give us a sign that he is aware.

So I was standing at the foot of the bed and the doctor was opening David’s eyes, rubbing the sensitive spot between his neck and shoulders and telling him it was time to wake up.  After a minute or so of this he seemed to actually wake up a bit, holding his eyes open on his own and moving around, but not frantically.  He seemed different somehow.  His fingers were brushing on his hospital gown in a way I hadn’t seen him do before.  He also had a blink-to-threat response, which was new.  The doctor kept trying to get him to show her two fingers or wiggle his toes, but he was not responding.  She asked me to come join in and see if a familiar voice would have an effect.

I was standing at his left side talking to him, requesting him to show us a sign he could hear us.  He reached out and I grabbed his hand and held onto it, mostly to make sure he didn’t make a move for his ventilator tube . . . and he held my hand back.  Up to this point, he would squeeze reflexively whenever his hand was held, or try to wrestle his hand away in a combative manner but this was different.  It was not reflexive or combative, it was intentional, reciprocal.  He actually shifted his hand around in mine to get in a better position and held on with his eyes open and moving back and forth slightly, appearing to search for the source of my voice.

And then he reached across his body with his other hand and put it on top of our two clasped hands and held on, not frantic, not agitated, but holding onto me.  It was such a clear sign to me, very different from any reaction or interaction I’d had with him thus far.  My heart ballooned in my chest and I just poured out how much I loved him and how good he was doing and how I was there for him, how we were there together.

I asked him to wiggle his toes.  He didn’t wiggle them but he did let go and reached towards his feet with one of his hands.  Again, so different from the way I’ve become used to seeing him act.  It was just unbelievable, and very clear to me that he was responding to my words, my presence.

The doctor was very pleased with the apparent increase in his awareness.  Said we were moving in the right direction, and that she thought it likely we would see a true response to command soon.  At several other times that morning David would open his eyes and I would talk to him, he would turn his head and shift his eyes, searching.  His protective mitts were back on so I didn’t get a chance to try to repeat the hand-holding.

I spent the rest of the morning reading to him, playing music for him and catching up on emails and things.  The pressure in his skull began to increase beyond the parameters set by the doctor, so the nurse got busy trying different things to bring it back down, none of which was really working.  I sat in on the “rounds,” where the doctor goes through all the details of the night before and makes her orders for the day.  She ordered some tweaks to David’s medications and ventilator settings to bring the pressure back down, which worked.

David’s mom and dad came and I packed up, said goodbye and left to spend the rest of the day with my sweet little Z and J.  When I got home they were still at church and so I had a bit of time to unpack and reorganize.  My heart lurched when my phone rang and I saw it was David’s mom.  I answered with my stomach in a ball and asked her how things were going.  I couldn’t believe my ears when she told me that the nurse, doing his routine repeat of the neuro exam, had actually gotten a response!  David held up two fingers when the nurse asked him to do so!  And he did it repeatedly, 3 times in a row.  And, on top of that, he wiggled his toes on command as well.  David’s mom held the phone up to his ear and I told him how proud I was and how much I loved him and how excited I was.  She said he moved his eyes and mouth a bit.

I was awash in a downpour of relief and gratefulness and I could hardly speak as I hung up with David’s mom.  I set my phone aside and knelt on our deck with my hands over my exploding heart and tried inadequately to give thanks in prayer to Heavenly Father.  I know the surging gratitude inside me was heard, was felt and was accepted, even though my words were insufficient to express it.

I have to admit I was also just a tiny bit mad that I missed it!!  I can’t wait to get back there tomorrow morning and see the miracle for myself!

He has over the course of this day continued to respond to commands, and removal from the ventilator now seems closer than ever.  Today marks one week to the day from his accident.

Well, not long after that phone call Z came bounding in the door.  Of course, the first thing she did was ask me how Daddy was doing.  I told her what had happened. . . . and the pure joy and love shining from her eyes, and the look on her face were a mirror image of the feelings inside my own heart.  She started jumping all around and cheering and we all had the happiest afternoon together.

In this moment it is hard for me to feel anything but optimism, hope, faith, humility, confidence and gratefulness.  And it is impossible for me to deny the role that God has played in this miracle, and that all of you have played in calling down His power on our little family.  He hears you, He hears me.  It doesn’t mean there won’t be difficulties ahead.  But it means He is at the helm.  And I mean to remember that, to embed it in my being, to trust in it as fully as I am able.