September 2010

A few weeks ago, John was moved to an intermediate facility. As always, we were very apprehensive about the move because each time John is moved it takes a bit for him to become acclimated to his surroundings and it's hard for us to see him struggle. The level of rehabilitation TIRR provides is meant to be short-term and while we knew that another move was inevitable we were just hoping that it would be a good one.

Throughout John's illness, we have been inspired and amazed that at each turn, we end up in great places with great staff and people who truly want to help John and this move has proven to be exactly the same. We are blessed once again with a beautiful and much smaller facility where John receives excellent care and is surrounded by staff who truly show an interest in helping him get better. This is also a short-term stay and soon we will begin the arduous task of looking at and deciding on long-term care for John. He still has good days and bad days and endears himself to all of those around him. Although at times it is hard for him to verbalize his feelings, his energy remains positive and his attitude is good. We feel as though this move has been a breath of fresh air and it is always good to have new professionals evaluating John for anything the previous facilities might have missed.

His newest physician mentioned to me that once you've treated one brain injured patient you've treated one brain injured patient. I found this statement truly profound in it's simplicity. Although each patient may exhibit certain characteristics specific for brain injury diagnosis, the paths leading them to the injury, type of injury etc. are all so different that it would be impossible to treat them the same. It is also true that being able to predict what might happen in the future is impossible because of the same reasons. We remain hopeful and so grateful that each of you have shown such an interest in, and love for John and his family.