Days 10 11 and 12

I have neglected writing here for a few days; mainly out of fear of what is inevitably staring us in the face. Mikey was making solid progress up to a few days ago; where it appears that he has been stuck for a few days. Traumatic Brain Injury patients have good and bad days, and sometimes even regress during recovery. At times we feel that he is displaying more progress, remembering the name and breed of Vinny's new puppy; "Cooter Brown" the baby Boston Terrier. Mikey also remembers us talking about the car that we just bought, a Saturn from a man at the hospital for $3500. The next day he asked about it and muttered something about "35k." Amidst all of the memory and recollection Mikey is still extremely confused and there is a large gap between us, blocking our communications. When we ask him to put up only one finger it is five mintues before he does it and acknowledges it. Sometimes during visitiation he blankly stares right through us at the television; completely captivted by that magic box whether it is on or off. He removed his nasal gastric tube sometime Friday night and Sunday he went into surgery for a PEG tube that goes directly to his stomach, yet he has not been fed with it yet. Seeing your little baby brother laying hopelessly in a hospital bed is difficult as is; but knowing that he had not been fed in 2 days was even more difficult. Here is a poor guy that has no way to fight for himself, no way to express his anger or hunger yet the medical professionals wave it off as no big deal, stating that the piccline was blocked. I asked the nurse, "What do you do if you want to make toast and the toaster is broken?" She gave me a blank stare before I reply "You make it in the oven." Simply not feeding Mikey because of a malfunctioning pickline is not legitimate reasoning, and is completely counter-intuitive to the entire healing process which is fueled by new growth and nutrition. I can only wonder if Mikey's blank stares, short attention span, and bad attitude have anything to do with his lack of nutrition. Sunday night Mikey was fed some electrolytes through an IV on his hand and the PEG tube is supposed to be ready to be used on Monday.

[Note: mom says "We are all glad he is getting adequate nutrition..." however the rest of us feel that quite the opposite is going on. We were outraged, disgusted, and worried at the state of Mikeys physical condition on Saturday and Sunday; he looked like he came straight out of Auschwitz. Only after I thoroughly embarassed myself by making a scene in the trauma unit Sunday evening did the nurses finally feed Mikey for the first time in two days. Our optimism and prayers fuel our hope that Mikey is able to keep progressing.]