Darren stayed in bed all day. He finally ate some pizza around 5:30pm. He did not eat breakfast or lunch. He sent me texts that said “I want to come home.” Which broke my heart.

I found out that he had a fever last night of 101.7. But he did not have one during the day, that was until around 7pm then it was 99.7. This is normal during the healing process. But it made him uncomfortable and grouchy. (Typical MAN?)

While we were there he napped for about an hour or so. I brought him pizza and Gatorade and his son thought he needed M&Ms which he ate the whole bag of.

His sister called and they talked for a short time. We ended up watching a rerun of AFV and he laughed a little. He then buried himself under his covers and complained of a headache. So we took the leftover pizza to the nurses  and stopped by WalMart on our way out of town.

By the time I pulled in our driveway he was texting me again.

I will be talking to the doctors tomorrow to see when he can come home. He said he doesn’t even want a “pass” to go to his son’s Blue and Gold banquet next Sunday.

We got Darren a pillow in the shape of a brain:

Darren told me more about his day today. He rode a bike and played Wii Bowling and used the Wii Balance Board for some therapy which are things we have at home that he can use after therapy to gain strength. He refused to tell me anything about speech therapy. (He hates that part of his day!)

His Physical Therapy and Occupational Therapy are each an hour long once a day and his Speech Therapy is 30 min twice a day. He is not sure what will happen this weekend. He knows his cousins that are coming to visit and knows we will be back to visit. Darren’s son and I also brought him a piece of Red Velvet Cake and at first he was trying to be funny and said it wasn’t good. Then he shoved the rest of it in his mouth.

He tried to fiddle with his chair alarm but he got caught!

Thank you for the healing prayers for him.
Hard to believe it was just one week ago he had his final surgery!  Wow!
Hope everyone had a great Valentine’s Day. The only thing that would have made this day better would be in Darren was home with us, but we are confident that will be soon.

Darren’s second day of rehab was “everything” he said. They started his day by getting him up at 7am. He met with the Psychiatrist and the Occupational Therapy and the Physical Therapy and Speech. He is aware of his memory loss.

Darren ate breakfast and lunch with the same two men from yesterday at their table.

When we arrived they had moved him to a different room because he has a chair alarm and a bed alarm. I guess he is a wanderer.

He said taking a shower last night felt great. He thought he had washed his hair though.

Darren had a really bad headache again but after taking meds and sitting quietly for awhile he perked up. He watched two episodes of “Honey Boo Boo” and he said “Oh these are reruns – remember this episode.” It was good to hear him laugh.

No one has spoke to me about the plans for his stay. I am contacting the RN we spoke to at the hospital about this.

He does not remember his parents being there on Tuesday. He did remember his son and I being there yesterday. He was really worried that we wouldn’t come tomorrow. I reminded him that tomorrow is Valentine’s Day and of course we would be there. He said “well, can’t do anything about that.”

Darren said he felt OK and that where he is staying is OK. He knows it is for a short time. He was more aware of things tonight.

Our son had school and so I dropped him off and went to Wal-Mart is a few blocks away. I needed to pick up a few things for Darren. I was standing in the Men’s section and it hit me. Everything that had happened these past 20 days. I began to cry right there!

I sucked it up (as my Dad would say) and finished shopping.  I came home and sat down in silence and Thanked God for the staff at KU and for Darren recovery.  Cried again. Then went about my day.

Our son had Parent/Teacher Conference and he is doing well. Despite everything going on at home. Darren has been his Math buddy and so now he thinks he can’t do it without him. So his grade in Math did drop this quarter but it is at a “C” so we are OK with that. We just need to work on it a bit more.

We finally got to see Darren at 6:30 tonight. I took Darren his clothes and toothbrush and stuff. He smiled when we came in. Darren had forgotten we were coming. He said they made him get up at 7am. Then therapies started by 8am. They happened until lunch. He met two other guys and he did therapy with them and he ate all three meals with them. Then we told him about Conferences and he said “I ate all three meals with the same 2 guys.”

“OK” I said. Then his son talked with him. His son left the room to use the bathroom and when he came back, Darren said “Well there he is! What’s up Little Man?” Darren looked at his laptop and looked up at us and said “Well how are you guys? I had a pretty good day, I ate with the same two guys all day.”

I quizzed him on what year it was, and he shooed me away and said he was tired of answering questions. We talked about the Olympics and then he got a really bad headache so the nurse came in and gave him some Tylenol. It did not help. He got really quiet and put his hand on his head. He says his head just hurts on the left side. His swelling is down a lot and when we got there his left eyelid was actually open all the way. As his headache got worse that eyelid began to droop lower than his right.

He treats his laptop like a security blanket. When his headache got worse I offered to put it on the table and he said “No!” and he grabbed it so I wouldn’t take it away.

I gave him a soft kiss and flashed him the sign for “I Love You” he nodded his head. His son said “Sorry your head hurts Daddy. Love you and remember to pray.” (What a sweet kid we have!)