Ok, here's a quick synopsis of the past few days, not in chronological order whatsoever...
She asked him a bunch of yes or no questions; he responded by counting "1,2..."
Trevor's leg tremors, or "clonis" as the med-heads like to call it, have now spread to the left leg and right arm. Whatever body part affected will just start vibrating out of control until it is repositioned. It makes everyone around him uncomfortable but he doesn't even seem to notice. The nurse wants to give him a muscle relaxing medication for it. The potential side effects of the medication are that it could make him fatigued and slow down therapy. I'm no doctor but it seems a little dumb to put him on medicine that would negatively affect his therapy when he's going through 6 hours of it per day.
Sitting in speech therapy with Trev gives me a whole lot of mixed emotions. I have to try my absolute hardest not to laugh or cry at the same time. It's excruciatingly painful to see him struggle and get stuck on words that normal people don't even have to think twice about, but at the same time some of the responses he comes up with are hilarious.
The therapist told Trevor to say the days of the week. He said Monday, Tuesday, Thursday, Thursday, etc. Forgot Wednesday and got stuck on Thursday.
She then gave him a calendar and asked him what month he was born in. He pointed directly to May. Score!
As messed up as it is for me to say, I think the best way to describe the way Trevor talks is like a little Latino kid with a speech impediment. Although it's really exciting to hear him talk, it's heartbreaking at the same time. You can tell he's thinking normally and has something he wants to say, but simply cannot get it out. And when he gets stuck on words, ("perseveration" as professionals with high-paying jobs would say) I don't think he realizes that what comes out of his mouth isn't actually what he was going for at all. He just kind of looks at you like "Are you dumb? How don't you get it?"
So the whole time we've been in the rehab unit, the medical staff has taken pride in the fact that they have supposedly never dropped a patient or let a patient fall. Three days ago, the man in Room 2615 fell. The night before last, the nurses dropped Trevor. Yesterday, they dropped another patient. Definitely don't think we will be leaving Trevor alone any time soon. Way to go dingbats!
Trevor and my mom went to take the elevator down to get lunch. They were sitting in the elevator and Trevor goes "One, one, one, one." A few minutes passed and my mom realized she never pressed the button. They were going to level one. Coincidence? No one will never know.
We're all getting really sick of Impatient Medical Rehab room 2613, so we try to stay away as much as possible. Once Trevor's meals get delivered, we head down to the cafeteria so we can all eat together in a new setting (which is already getting old for the record). As far as hospital food goes, they do pretty well here. Trevor and I are super down with the self-serve frozen yogurt. We pretty much share a cup of it with every meal. It turns into a cycle of him trying to drink it out of the spoon, me telling him it's a spoon not a straw, him trying to drink it out of the side of the cup, me telling him to use the spoon and then him finally using the spoon. Over and over again. This makes me wonder how good his short term memory is. He eventually gets it, but it definitely takes a while.
His sense of humor gets better and better each day. His facial expressions are getting more Trevor-ish by the second. You can usually tell what bad or nice word he is trying to call you by the look on his face. Not stoked for him to call me "whore" or "fat-ass" every five seconds again, but it's definitely coming soon!
Yesterday at lunch, Trevor stole my dad's cheeseburger, unwrapped it and went to take a bite. I told him no way, and he got a huge smile on his face, laughed and set it back down.
On the way back up to his room, I put him in charge. I asked which way he wanted to go; he said "straight." I said "you really want me to push you into that wall?" He laughed and said "nope". I asked him if he wanted to go right; "nope". I asked him if he wanted to go left; "nope". I told him to point to where he wanted to go; he pointed to Starbucks and said "shoe". I wheeled him over to Starbucks and asked what he wanted; he pointed to the menu and said "shoe" again. Super helpful, thanks Trevor. As I was ordering him something to drink, he yanked my wallet out of my hand, grabbed my Nascar credit card and threw it at the cashier. I hope the barista spat in his drink.
Our homework assignment for tonight is to go home and try to get dressed with one hand so we know how Trevor feels. I'm probably going to cheat.
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