Mama’s session, Victoria, Maggie

Everything worked out for Mama to make it to her physical therapy session yesterday. She was picked up at the farm by one lady from our church and picked up after the session by another lady from our church. I picked her up at the home of the second lady – Betty. Betty is a little over eighty years old but in very good health. She has a condo in Decatur and insisted that she could get Mama and keep her comfortable until I got there to pick her up. Mama did not get any rest while she was with Betty. Betty is a sweetheart, but she is a talker. I think it worked out well. Mama needed the extended conversation after having been cooped up for the last several weeks. Mama has recurring appointments on Monday and Friday each week for the next ten weeks. On some of those days I will have to go to work an hour early, so I can go to the house at 10 am and pick her up for the appointment at 10:30. I will then have to take my lunch break to take Mama home from the appointment. On some days Victoria will be available to help. On other days there will be help provided from others, but at least we now have a plan.

Mama’s session went well. The therapist was not overly concerned about Mama’s current lack of flexibility. He used a TENS unit to get her quadriceps stirred up, but Mama could not feel the muscle at the knee. She still has very little feeling around the knee; especially on the inside of the joint. The therapist assured her that was normal for this point in the recovery. We will be monitoring it as we progress through the treatments. I still have an area on the outside of the left knee – the lower quadricep area – in which I still have no feeling from an injury to that area when I worked odd jobs in West Virginia thirty years ago. But I am hoping better things for Mama. She was encouraged overall. The therapist loaded her up with exercises. I believe Mama will be faithful to do them. She really wants this to be a full and complete recovery. So do we. The therapist told Mama that if we were not able to establish the full range of motion, the hospital could put her under anesthetic and bend the leg fully while she was asleep. I’ll be that sounds horrible. We are hoping to avoid that option. It is there if we need it.

Pray for Victoria. She is trying to stay close to Grandma and Grandpa but is rapidly approaching the time when she will have to put them at arm’s length. Lately, they have both begun to hound her about spiritual issues – on which they have come to differ with us in some dramatic ways. They will not go to church and consider us to be hypocrites because we do go to church. They are convinced that no one in the churches of today are really saved. They are just playing church. Part of a social club. Sadly, there is an element of truth to that argument. According to Grandma and Grandpa, if they really knew God they would not be a part of the churches of today – they would separate themselves from “the unclean thing”. Grandma and Grandpa are starting to delve into areas of mysticism as opposed to Bible doctrine. It is starting to wear on Victoria and she is very attached to Grandma and Grandpa so letting go is going to be painful. If she has the strength to let go. Right now, she is hurting – and I know Grandma and Grandpa do not know how much they are hurting her - because of the daily debates so please keep her in your prayers. In their minds, they do not want Victoria lost to the hedonistic churches of today. In our minds, we are asking, “Where sis that come from?”

Pray for Maggie. Maggie’s surgery is scheduled for Friday. She was debating even having the surgery, so I am not sure if the plan is to follow through or postpone, but it too is a matter of prayer. Any time the belly is cut into, there is a long recovery and for a mother of little ones, that can seem an interminably long period of time. There is a special membrane, the Mesentery, that keeps our intestines and belly organs in place. Even the tiniest piercing of that membrane is an injury of the highest order to the body. It heals slowly. Once it has been cut, there is a period of time in which you cannot lift any significant weight. To do so puts pressure on the abdomen and the Mesentery which could reopen the wound. It is that long recovery time that has Maggie worried. And she is a long-term worrier. She has help scheduled for the first two weeks but not for the following additional ten weeks. I am sure there is help available. It is just not scheduled the way Maggie would like it to be. If she postpones the surgery, the conflict will not change, but perhaps Aaron will be available to help. He is not available right now. I am sure it will all work out if she does have the surgery, but it is her and Aaron’s decision to make.

God is still good.