Sunday, July 24, 2005

Sunday July 24, 2005 Zack has been fever free for almost 4 days and his white count is back down to 10, which is normal. It looks like we are lickin’ this infection. Dr Han (attending Neuro Surgeon) comes by with Dr Densler and another resident. They discuss the laceration on his head and Dr Han tells me to be sure that Zack has a wound care nurse at Frazier. They decide to leave the staples in his head another week just to be sure that everything is under control with the laceration and no further swelling occurs. It appears as though the swelling is going down so the laceration area seems a bit sunken since there is no scull in that area. We discuss how much longer the bone flap will be off.
They also tell me that his bone flap (scull) that was sent to the blood bank was contaminated. If the cultures they took grow anything his bone flap will be discarded and they will make him a custom-made acrylic bone flap. Dr Apfel (attending Anest) comes with his residents during rounds and discussed that there are no respiratory issues that they are concerned with. We talk about Zack’s accident and the fact that no one in the car was wearing seatbelts. Dr Apfel is from Germany and we have a very interesting discussion. He explains that the U.S. has twice as many car fatalities as Germany and there is only about 2% of the German population that doesn’t wear their seatbelts. He believes that Americans value freedom so much that individual freedom of choice overcomes rational thinking. We choose not to wear our seatbelts as a subconscious assertion of freedom. It is even more prevalent among American teenagers because they are trying to pull away from their parents and have more freedom. Isn’t it sad that the value we hold so dear also causes us such tragedies? At 9:30 Neika (day nurse) moves him to his chair and he supports his head for quite a while. At 10:30 he has physical therapy with the weekend therapist. I leave to go to church and Scott comes to really work him over. He tells me that Zack did 30 crunches with his legs and arms. Don’t get too excited because our idea of crunches has changed in the last 17 days. Zack stayed 5 hours in his chair before they moved him back to bed. He napped for a while and had several visitors. He squeezed Avery and Caroline’s hands. He stuck out his tongue a few times for the staff. He is responding to the verbal commands that he chooses to follow. At 5:30 Dr Miller (Anest resident) removed his Trach stitches. His skin will now hold it in place and the stitches are no longer needed. Zack is at his best (most alert and responsive) at night. Andy and Kelly Raines come by around 10:00 PM. He holds Kelly’s hand tightly and when she tries to pull away he won’t let her. He stares intently into your face. It is almost magical. I am reminded of the thoughts I had driving in early this morning. How God lovingly doles out discipline in perfect amounts. How He knows my greatest fear is that as my children grow up and go off to college they would move away from Him. That they would make choices that lead them to lose their faith. This trial we are going through now will change us. It will make us stronger. It teaches us that when we fear the future God will send us reminders that He is in control. This life is but a whisper in God’s ear. We do not know what he has planned for us only that it will be perfect. My close friend Donna told me tonight that Zack is like a pebble thrown into a lake and you can see the ripples traveling out in all directions. Tonight Zack rest peacefully. We didn’t get our orders to transfer out of ICU in preparation to go to Frazier but it’s O.K. (there wasn’t an empty bed for him to move to any way). God has a reason for keeping us here one extra day and I can’t wait for tomorrow to find out why.