doing the hard work
1 minute read
the road back
Sleep. All I, and John’s dad wanted was to sleep without the worry that we might wake up to find an empty hospital bed so the first few nights we took turns sleeping and keeping watch. Then, between the nurses, head hospital psychiatrist and a host of other people, we had a fairly tight system in place to minimize the risk that our strong-willed/weak bodied young man would be able to pack up and walk himself out of the hospital. (We did learn that if the head team of doctors determined that it would be detrimental to his health to leave, they could physically keep him there, but I really didn’t want to find out what that looked like.)
We quickly fell into a new daily, hourly routine which was much busier (and louder) than the previous hospital. The acute-inpatient physical rehab program occupies about half of the 8th floor of the hospital and looks like a cross between a psych ward and a not-fancy gym. And for some reason it seemed that every patient was using their call button all day and night so there was never quiet - it was a constant, chaotic symphony of bells ringing, machines beeping and whirring and hushed hallway conversations. It was nerve wracking for a healthy person so I couldn’t imagine how the patients dealt with it along with their attempt at getting well.
A huge space across the hall from the patient rooms contained every kind of equipment imaginable - mats, bikes, bars, ropes, it was a maze of devices that the therapists used to coax battled and damaged bodies back to functioning. It was painful to watch John try to perform his required exercises - he couldn’t bend over and was in constant pain from his leg muscle atrophy. The first few days it wore him out just to walk to the gym so he had to rest before he could even start to try his routine.
In addition to the physical rehab he also had speech and occupational therapy every day. Between the appointments, meals and naps the days were full but I could see that John was getting more depressed and would barely speak. While the therapists meant well it was ridiculous to listen to a session where my 19 year old, addicted and recently overdosed (2x!) son was being told that things like climbing on ladders was dangerous and that he should be thinking about getting a job that didn’t require physical labor due to his injuries. Seriously!? I was dumbfounded and so angered by the fact that not one person was speaking to him about addiction or treatment or rehab - if you didn’t know why he was there you’d have thought he’d been in a car accident. So momma went to work trying to figure out where could John go from here? That’s when I learned a LOT about treatment options and health insurance.