Yes! We Are!

Going Home! Surprising developments for Udell and I but good news for Shannon! She is going home tomorrow! She is very excited and thrilled to be going. Mom and Dad are glad to be leaving the hospital too but WE recognize the challenges ahead. We are concerned some for how Shan will respond when she gets home, and realizes she "won't wake up from the nightmare" that she thinks she is having. Reality may hit very hard.

Our road is far from being over. Therapies will begin again on Thursday. Shan still needs to eat enough and drink enough so we will be tracking that. The home schedule won't change much from the hospital schedule. People who would like to call or visit Shannon need to set up a time by contacting me. She cannot have too many visitors in one day and they can't stay for very long. Until we see that Shannon has built up her endurance, we still need to limit her activities. The tough part will be that she won't think she needs to have her activities curtailed and she will think she is just fine.

Her facebook will most likely be deactivated. She doesn't seem to want to follow the rules already. It is not uncommon. The "executive functions" capability are still impaired and it will take some time for those to come full circle. From the manual, "Traumatic Brain Injury, A guide for Families" it states, "Executive functions include planning, goal setting, self-monitoring, self control, self-initiating, self evaluating and flexible problem solving. Distractibility, poor organization, the inability to contol emotions and many other changes in behaviors are all signs of changes with the barain's ability to perform executive functions." Further the manual says "Each brain injury is different and so are the changes in behavior for each child. Behaviors often seen in children with tramatic brain injury (TBI) include:
*tiredness and fatigue
*forgetfulness
*distractibility
*poor organization
*irritablity and anger
*sexual inappropriateness
*Impulsiveness
*social immaturity
*self centeredness
*passive behavior
*depression

We have seen all of the above behaviors in Shannon all ready. And to add to that, she is a teenager!! She won't be able to be left alone for quite a while. The doctors keep telling us that she will be very vunerable for the next year at least and that we will need to take some major steps to insure her safety. She won't like any of it but I guess most teenagers don't like any controls either.

It's a scary time but a promising time....we have looked forward to this day for a long time. It will be 7 weeks tomorrow.. Time for another major change in our journey of miracles. We, as well as Shannon will truly benefit from your faith and prayers. It will be more difficult to keep up with the blog but we will try. We have been told numerous times that the blog is helping different people. If, by us sharing our story and our faith, we can make a difference in someone else's life, it will be the least we can do to thank God for his many miracles!
Pheobe