Major Milestones

The end of the day was well worth the wait!! Shannon made it back from the CT scan a little before 4pm. Shortly after, the neurosurgeon resident came and took Aaron and me (Udell) through the results of the MRI and CT scans that had been done earlier in the day. He was pleased that the scans did not show anything unexpected. Perhaps the main thing they wanted to see from the scans was whether or not Shannon had suffered serious vascular injuries that would be manifested in things like strokes or other large area brain injury. The scans did not show anything like that. Consistent with the force of the injury, there is evidence of DAI (diffuse axonal injury) like what would happen with a severe concussion except they take longer to heal than a bruise from a concussion. We don't know what kinds of challenges may result from that--only time will tell. But Shannon is a fighter and with your continued faith and prayers she can tackle them.

While the neurosurgeon was giving us the update on the scans, the rest of the team came to remove the breathing tube. So the breathing tube is out!! She is off all the sedation meds that she has been on for the past 9 days. They will be shifting to some other medications as they watch her adjust to the significant changes that have occurred today. Somewhere in the middle of all of the travel and exams, she was examined by an ophthalmologist. Her left eye has been really swollen and we wanted to make sure that there was nothing else that needed to be done. He indicated that it is swelling of the tissues around her eye resulting from the original injury, and that the swelling should diminish over the next several days.

So the summary version is that Shannon accomplished many milestones today, and she is tired. It has been a very eventful and busy day for her. Although she is waking up, that is not to say that she is alert and talking and all of that. She is responsive to us some of the time, but still has a long way to go to overcome the injuries and the trauma she has gone through, not to mention the treatments of the past many days. There are more milestones in store for tomorrow as they do some additional testing to determine if we can lose the cervical collar, which I think she will really enjoy. She deserves a restful night. As always, we appreciate more than you can know your support, faith and prayers.