Progress

Matt's Dad has been moved to the inpatient rehab center. This is good, as he is able to start physical therapy and speech therapy. Linda is getting trained on the therapy techiniques and how to care for Lee once he is home. We still have a long process, but these are a few of the baby steps that we are taking. At this moment, there are decisions to be made for further care after rehab and work (early retirement or return). We are having to make plans for every possible situation. I know that Linda is overwhelmed with everything and I believe the reality of what we are looking at is starting to sink in. We know that God can work wonders in Lee's brain and we are as hopeful as ever that he will make a full recovery, but still- making plans and thinking about all the different situations can be draining.

We are heading up tomorrow after Caleb get's out of school and will be up for the weekend. Please continue to pray for Linda as she begins the long process of setting their affiars in order, for Lee as he makes progress and for Matt and Heather as they work with Linda for Lee's care and such.

I will post pictures of the kids soon. I know you all are wanting to see them!

Update #3 on Matts Dad

We are home for the week and will be heading back to KY for the weekend. Lee made it out of surgery fine. We have been able to spend some time with him in ICU. Hopefully sometime today they will move him into a regular room and out of the ICU. They are just waiting for a bed. He is dealing with Aphasia at the moment. It has been difficult for all of us to see a man who is never short of words be unable to communicate. As the swelling of the brain subsides, we are hopeful that he will regain use of his language skills and writing skills. I know he gets very frustrated that he cannot tell you what he wants to say. He is also weak on the right side which we think is due the pressure from the abscess that was on that side of the brain. The Doctors seem to think that that his strength will increase as the swelling goes down. We had a hard time saying goodbye yesterday. Even though we know in 5 days we will be back there, the distance makes it that much harder. Please continue to keep Lee in your prayers. We have all faith in our Heavenly Father to take care of Lee and to get him to the place that fits in His plan. The waiting can be difficult, since God's time is not our own.


Here is a link on Aphasia if you are interested inreading about it: http://www.aphasia.org/Aphasia%20Facts/aphasia_faq.html

Update #2 on Matts Dad

Sorry I didn't get to you all earler. Lee had a successful surgery this morning. He went in about 7:30 and was done by 9:30. We saw him around 10:30.

The surgery went well. The doctor's believe it was just an abcess. There are still tests to be ran, but they don't believe it is a tumor. There is a lot of swelling on the brain and once that is gone they believe he will regain most, if not all, of his articulation and movement.

Thanks for the prayers.

Update: Matt's Dad

Well Lee went down this morning for a MRI so they could map his brain and know where to go and not to go. He has been sleeping most of the day which has been good since I don't think there has been much in the rest department since Wednesday. It was a little bit of a rough morning, but is slowly getting better. He will undergo surgery tomorrow morning around 7:30 Louisville time. WE will be up at the Hospital early to see him before he goes in. I am unsure what was in the last update, so I will try to recount what we have found out in the last few days.

The infectious disease Dr. Is now leaning towards a mass infection in his brain (Abscess). The heavy duty drugs they have been giving him lowered his fever a little bit and that is hopeful. They will not know for sure until the operation tomorrow, but we are happy about that piece of good news. Hew is still having language issues due to the placement of the mass in his brain. He cannot remember the grand kids names nor any of ours. He can remember and say certain information such as Linda's name and his birth date. He mainly uses one word responses and there is about a min to 2 min pause before a reply. you can tell that he wants to say something, but can't get it out. He is aware of what will be happening tomorrow and I know he is a little scared. They are unsure about what kind of recovery he will have and whether he will regain his speech.

Hopefully sometime tomorrow I can post about the surgery and hopefully we will have good news. Thanks to all of you who have emailed or left comments. They are such an encouragement to us knowing that there are many prayers going up for our family. We TRULY appreciate them!!!!!

Urgent Prayer Request

My father in Law in in the hospital as I type this. We thought he had a small stroke this morning, but have since learned that it is possibly a brain tumor. We are asking for all who read this to please pray for Him and for all of us. Right know we do not know whether it is cancerous or a mass infection. Either way he will have to have surgery. The doctors are doing a chest scan to see if there is any cancer in his chest. They should know those results in the morning and the doctors will decide how to proceed. Once the decision is made, the surgery will take place rather quickly- they have already stated they will not wait long. Matt and Heather are at the hospital with Lee and Linda. Please keep our family in your prayers as we await the test results and diagnosis. I will try to update as soon as I can.

More coming

There will be more posts coming. I have to download the pictures from Indiana and Halloween. So Hopefully (hopefully) I will get that done tomorrow and get a few more posts up before it is all said and done! So check back soon!

Belated Camping Pictures

For some reason, blogger is having issues and I can't get the pictures in the right order and it will only let me type in certain spots....so here you go! It looks like the kids wer eout like lights in the above picture, but they were just posing. About 2HOURS later was when they finally kicked the bucket. :) We had a great time and went close by. We had an amazing view of the lake and had a blast fishing, making smores and playing in the tent.

*After the smores- YUM!*
*Getting the campfire started*
*The view from our site*
*Our Camp*
*Concentrating on catching a fish*

*The lake in the morning*
*Ian eagerly awaiting his fishing pole*
*Caleb pretending to be cold*
*Riley ready for some "princess" fishing*
*Peepingout the kid size escape route*
*Mommy showing Riley how to reel it in*
*Examining the fish*
*Ian's fish*
*Concentration*

We had a great time and we are looking forward to the next time. There was not much sleep had by the adults, but the kids were rearing to go at 7 am.