Friday January 6, 2006

Friday January 6, 2006 Zack had to get back to his normal schedule in order to be at Frazier East for therapy this morning. The last few days he has been able to sleep in because he was taking his Neuro Psych Exam at Frazier Rehab downtown and didn’t have to be there until 1:00 pm. The first part of the exam was on Wednesday so before I left for work I wrote a list of things that Zack needed to do before I was back to pick him up. I woke him to give him his meds and also gave him his cell phone so that I could call and be sure that he was up on time. I decided to lay some clothes out for him because we would be visiting with the nursing staff on 4 South (where he lived for 69 days) and I wanted him to look nice (I didn’t want to show up and have him dressed in sweat pants).
His list included reminders to eat a good breakfast, shave and remember to put his pill case in his pocket. I arrived to pick him up in time for us to have lunch together. He looked great in his sport coat and his hair fixed perfectly with gel to hide his scars. As we ride to Frazier Rehab I remind him of who we will see there and he points out people in his photo album. He closes his book and says, “Don’t tell Dad but I’m really close to you now”. I remind him that I spent a lot of time with him the last 6 months and right after the accident I never left his side. I told him I was lucky to have an understanding boss that enabled me to be off for a long time but his Dad had to go back to work after two weeks or so. I told him he was never alone, except for late at night when he was sleeping, and that when I got too tired his Dad came to stay with him. When we get to Frazier we decide to let him walk up to the nurse’s station without me to see if they recognize him. He walks up and says, “Hello, have you seen Zack Hornback?” They were all in shock and couldn’t get over how good he looked. We got to see Dana, Jennifer, Shirley, Dr. Mook and Heidi. Zack recognized almost everyone but didn’t remember exactly what they did for him. Then we go to find Mary Beth (O.T.) and Amy (P.T.) in the therapy gym. They were quite impressed with him and couldn’t believe how good he looked. They promised to come to our house soon and play pool and then we went to see Kathy in speech. She recognized him right away and we discussed how aphasia is still his daily battle. She told Zack how in the beginning she thought he would never talk and that she spent many hours dealing with aphasia early in his recovery. Finally it was time for him to go to the psychology department and check in for his evaluation. While he met with Dr. Frantom I was given a stack of questions to answer. The first page was 150 questions about Zack’s behavior and then they handed me another form with just as many similar questions (and I thought Zack was the one being tested). Once Dr Frantom was finished with Zack she said she needed to ask me a few questions. I was with her for an hour discussing Zack’s symptoms and giving her information about the book I just read, Instrumental Enrichment and Rhythmic Writing. She explained that many therapists are resistant to new ideas because they have been education to think about therapy in one way (inside the box) and it is difficult for them to think outside of the box. She also tells me that it will take up to three weeks to get the evaluation results (and I thought we would know something next week). Finally I am able to leave and go back to work while Zack is being tested. When I return Zack is waiting for me and seems pretty upbeat. He nonchalantly tells me that the test was really hard then he clarifies it by saying that some of it was hard but some of it was easy. I asked him to give me an example of something that was hard for him and he said, “Name three vegetables”. He was not able to name one. Again we see that the aphasia has a tight hold on him. If they were to give him a list of 100 items and tell him there were 3 vegetables on that list he would correctly pick them out but he can’t recall their names on his own. We stop by again to say goodbye to Mary Beth and Amy and then go back to 4 South to see what night shift nurses might be on duty. We see Emily the ward secretary and the first one that Zack would flirt with all the time. She told Zack how he uses to ask her if she wanted to take a shower with him and then teased him that she had given him many showers while he was there. His face turned red and he got very embarrassed. We head for home and he tells me he is very tired and can’t wait to take a nap. While we were driving he puts on one of his new CD’s and says that this kind of music sounds really good to me. It is Switchfoot (when I look at the sun) and I am thankful that for a while I have a reprieve from Rap. Zack goes straight to bed and sleeps for 1 ½ hours and when he wakes up he is ready to play me in cards. We play while I am making dinner and then continue our game after we eat. Scott tells me he would like to go watch some football game somewhere and then Zack tells him he needs to talk to him about something. I hear him tell Zack to go get dressed and then Scott comes in to talk to me. He wants to know if I have any idea what Zack wants to talk to him about and seems amusingly nervous. He goes in the other room and Zack comes in to tell me that he is going to tell his Dad that he wants to get closer to him. Scott tells Zack to get in the truck and they leave. Fifteen minutes later they are back and Zack is smiling. He goes downstairs to play pool with Dylan and Scott sits down with tears in his eyes and tells me of their conversation. He says Zack told him that he has gotten really close to me and that’s great but he wants to spend more time with his Dad. Scott tells him about the song by Jim Croce (remember Cats in the cradle) that talks about a boy that always wanted to spend time with his Dad and his Dad never has time. Then the boy grows up and the Dad wants to spend time with him but the boy never has time. He told Zack (with tears streaming down his face) that he just gave him what every Dad wants…a teenage boy that wants to spend time with him. Zack finishes his pool game and comes up to play cards with me. I tell him how happy his Dad is that he wants to get close to him and then we talk about all our family has been through these last 6 months. I tell him how hard it was the first few weeks at University Hospital and how I started this website and people would post messages. I told him about one message in particular that was a gift from God during a very emotional time. I said it was from a teenage girl that went to Christian Academy and she was responding to my entry when I was so desperate for him to wake up. She told me that she believed that God was using this time to talk to Zack, that He was revealing himself to Zack and when He was through talking with him He would wake him up. Zack sat very quiet and listened to my story. I asked him if he felt like God had been talking with him and he said he hadn’t thought about it much until then but he thinks that maybe God was talking with him. He told me he really wanted me to find that message in the printed copies I have from the website. He went to bed with a very thoughtful expression and I began to read. I stayed up until after midnight searching for the message and finally found it on July 15th. Andrea Chadwick had said just that and she also believed that God was holding Zack tightly in his arms telling him that everything would be alright. I am transported back to that night and reliving the experience. I vividly remember how desperate I felt and that it was the first time that I was mad at Zack because he wouldn’t wake up. I was alone in his room at about 7:00 PM when I finally had time to read the postings that someone had printed off and brought to the hospital for me. I had read several before getting to Andrea’s and when I read it I felt Gods peace come over me like a blanket. I raised my hands to heaven in that darkened room and said “Thank you God”. Then I turned to look at Zack (no longer angry) and said, “When you are done talking with him, wake him up”. Now I am crying as I mark the page and head to bed. I try to sleep but am feeling all of the emotions of those early days. I thank God for rescuing us and drift to sleep knowing that he has miracles in store that will be revealed when I see Zack’s smile the next morning.
Thursday I repeat the list for Zack and go down to his room with his meds. I wake him long enough to hand him the pills and glass of water and then walk towards his closet. He stops me and says he wants to pick out his own clothes. I leave corrected and head to work. When I am on my way to pick him up he calls me wondering what is taking so long (apparently Dr. Perri’s fear that Zack wouldn’t want to go back to complete the 2nd part of the test is unfounded). I tell him I will be pulling up in 5 minutes and when I arrive he is standing on the corner waiting. He looks sharp, hair fixed just so and then I realize he is wearing the jacket to his new suit (the one I am expecting him to wear to Winter Ball next weekend). He smiles and says it is important to look good. When he gets in the car he turns the radio down and says he has two things to tell me. He says that after he tells me the first one he doesn’t want me to forget about the second. I am intrigued as he continues. He says, “I was with God a lot last night. I thought about all that stuff you read me. And the second thing is I want to learn some new dance moves.” I am torn between laughing and crying. He says that dance is next week and he wants to learn some new moves. I ask if he means slow dancing and he says no he is great at that, he wants some new moves to “tear up the dance floor”. We agree that he should talk to Rick Thompson because he can really dance. We grab a sandwich on the way and get there in time to visit the nursing staff on 4 South. This time we get to see the other Jennifer and her reaction to the Zack with hair. She recognizes him right away but is blown away at his progress. We stop in again to say hello to Mary Beth and Amy and Zack takes a turn at the “light board” in the therapy gym. He obviously is much better at this now and he knows it. He goes to the psychology office to begin the 2nd half of the test. We sit down and Zack tells me that he really likes those two girls, they are his “buds” and I tell him that they loved him. He looks at me surprised and says, “How could they love me when I was so messed up when I was here?” That’s why they loved you, I replied and I leave to go back to work. When I return to pick him up at 4:00 he is not finished. They come out to tell me that they have about 30 minutes longer that he could either complete now or come back on another day. He is tired but wants to get it over with so I wait. While he continues I ask one of the therapist how he is doing. She seems surprised at how well he is doing in the math portion of the test and confirms what Frazier East has said, that his math skills are in tact. However in reading comprehension he is not doing so well. As Zack would put it “I suck at reading”.
The aphasia is a major barrier here but also his visual perception problem makes just simply reading difficult. He has to exert all of his resources just to stay on the line he is trying to read (remember his eye movements are three times what they should be) then he has no energy left for comprehension. He would do better if we read him the paragraphs but then the aphasia would still prevent him from understanding some of the words we were reading. Zack was an honors English student and now he could not tell you what a vegetable is. We are not discouraged. Time, therapy and prayer will heal this deficit and we have faith that in Gods timing we will beat aphasia. It is 6:00 pm when we get home and Zack is very tired. We had eaten a sandwich on the drive home so he goes straight to bed. I go to wake him at 7:00 (Brooke Willoughby and her Mom had arrived) and Zack is walking up the stairs. He plays pool with Brooke and we watch “Dancing with the Stars” (I tease him about picking up some of their dance moves). After they leave we sit in the living room and I read to him again about the early days in the hospital. He stares at his feet as I recall the day when I fought with the doctors about pulling the tube out of his mouth because he hated it so much. I read to him the many postings by teenagers who were praying for him, even those that had never met him. He listens quietly for nearly an hour and then tells me he is tired, wants to go to bed and I can read more to him tomorrow. He stands up to leave and says, “I really am much closer to God now”. Again I stay up until after midnight reading these early postings. I vividly remember the night that I spent in his room, comforting him as he pointed to the tube in his mouth. I would pray with him, made promises to get that tube out and fought with the doctors the next day to have it removed. Memories of events come flooding back as I sat staring at those pages with tears streaming down my face. I remember the day that Dr Mutchnick came to explain that some patients aren’t able to manage the fluid that the brain produces and a shunt has to be put in to drain the fluid into the stomach. I asked him if he thought Zack would need it and what else could they do to “wake him up”. He looked at me and said the cruelest words I had heard since the ER doctor told us Zack may not live. He gestured to Zack lying motionless in his bed and said, “You need to get use to the idea that this may be all you ever have”. I looked at him in shock as he continued, “He may never wake up”. He left me in that room crying and so devastated that I didn’t even put it on the website. I remember walking like a zombie through the halls of the hospital that night mumbling the 23 Psalm and crying out to God. He heard me. I read about the day I went to look at Kosair Hospital with the intent of having Zack transferred there when he could no longer stay in University ICU. Although I had asked for God’s guidance I had already made up my mind and told Dr Mutchnick to start the process. But later that night when I called Kim Meyers (nurse for the Neurosurgery group) to see if they had started those arrangements she told me that Zack had been denied as a patient by Dr Moriority at Kosair. I was in shock and then she told me that we might want to start looking at transitional homes (their nice way of saying that Zack might be put in a nursing home). These were the lowest moments of our time at University and as I read about them every emotion comes flooding back. But then I read the posted messages…hundreds of people lifting Zack up in prayer, many of them never met him. I remember my niece bringing me the postings to the hospital one day and pointing out certain messages from teenagers quoting scripture. She was amazed at their depth of faith and their assurance that Zack would wake up. When you doubt this generation of teenagers just read what they wrote to me out of their own despair…how they turned to God for the answers. I go to sleep with that picture in my mind of God on his throne smiling down at me saying “Oh Eileen just wait until tomorrow”. We have physical evidence of the power of prayer and the mercy of our awesome God.
Friday Zack is back at Frasier East to continue therapy. He takes his driving manual with him with the intent to convince Suzanne (OT) that he is ready to take the test. When I pick him up I talk with her about how he did on the Neuro Psych evaluation. Zack had already told her that it was very hard and we discussed how specific his injury is to the language portion of his brain. She told me that her and Leslie (speech) had talked about ways to help Zack recall those words and suggested that a laptop computer might help. They agree that like most teenagers Zack does not take very good notes but he likes working on the computer so they want to develop techniques to incorporate a laptop into his therapy. She said it is obvious that Zack is very intelligent and they are baffled by his aphasia. She also agrees to let Carol Britton (a tutor from Christian Academy) come in next week to observe Zack in speech and OT so we can begin working with her on Rhythmic Writing and Instrumental Enrichment. I have hopes that these Christian based methods will develop new pathways and be the key to unlocking Zack’s words. They see them as treatments for people with learning disabilities (not brain injuries) and aren’t certain that they are applicable for Zack. I hope to change their opinion with Zack’s success. But considering where we were just six months ago, Zack lying in bed unable to walk, talk or feed himself, aphasia seems like a small problem. We pray specifically that God will re-file those words properly in Zack’s brain and have faith that in His time it will happen. God is probably laughing with us at some of the comical words Zack uses to express relatively simple request (we only have to look at the Giraffe to appreciate God’s humor). But if it never completely goes away and Zack always struggles to read we are a far cry from “this may be all you ever have” and him not speaking at all. When we are discouraged we only need to read the first 2 months of postings to put it all back into perspective. Zack’s life has been changed forever, not by aphasia, but by the knowledge of how many people cared for him. Many others have been changed by Zack’s story and, although they may not be as conscientious about their choices now as they were when this first happened, they only need to see Zack to be reminded of how God answers prayers. Zack’s understanding that he is closer to God is worth more than an honors degree. We are blessed beyond belief but this is not over. We pray with certainty that God will continue to heal Zack and use it for His glory. Continue praying for complete recovery and know in your heart “The Lord is the everlasting God, the creator of the ends of the earth. He will not grow tired or weary, and His understanding no one can fathom. He gives strength to the weary and increases the power of the weak. Even youths grow tired and weary, and young men stumble and fall: but those who hope in the Lord will renew their strength. They will soar on wings like eagles: they will run and not grow weary, they will walk and not be faint.” Isaiah 40:28-31