3:1 (aka 3/20/13)

At one point in the long weeks leading up to Christmas, when John had sort of adjusted to being home and was into the rhythm of therapy every other day, but felt like he wasn't seeing fast enough progress in returning to feeling like himself, his OT told us the 3:1 rule. It takes 3 days at home, she explained, for every one day in the hospital to return to your pre-hospitalization state of health. At the time, I was NOT interested in hearing a projection that far out and did not calculate when that would happen (this was probably when I heard the radio DJ say something about how Robin Roberts was in the hospital for 4 weeks and they couldn't imagine being in the hospital that long -- and I swerved as I yelled, "Try imagining more than twice that long!!!"). Sometime in January, when we realized that John wasn't able to return to work yet, I did count out those days.

And today we’ve hit that special 3:1 day -- he has now been home three times as long as he was away in the hospital.  Looking at his face, he looks like he's back to where his general health was when he had his accident. This is not to say that he's close to completely recovered -- that path still winds ahead of us. But he looks like himself. 

At this point, he has to keep up his amazing efforts at rehabbing to recover as much pre-accident strength as he can and to train more muscles to regain function. He needs to build up stamina -- he still sleeps several hours during the day, in addition to a full night's sleep -- because he still suffers from significant fatigue just from his ADLs (activities of daily living), and he deals with pain on a daily basis. And he has to learn to live with the differences between where he gets and where he was on July 29th, including the side effects of the SCI that are most likely permanent, like clonus:

a series of involuntary, rhythmic, muscular contractions and relaxations. Clonus is a sign of certain neurological conditions, particularly associated with upper motor neuron lesions involving descending motor pathways, and in many cases is, accompanied by spasticity (another form of hyperexcitability). … clonus causes large motions that are usually initiated by a reflex [from the ubiquitous Wikipedia]

and tremors in his hands.

But we are blessed and we know it: the destination we are headed toward is so much  better than it could have been as to be scary -- it is a miracle that is daunting to be worthy of. A sacred thought to ponder as we enter into the days leading up to Good Friday and Easter...

So I'll close with a wish for you all: Happy 1st day of spring! May it bring you all the rejuvenation you seek.