Nate is Home!

After being hospitalized over 9 mos, we brought Nathan home Sept 30th.
It was a long time coming and it was finally happening.
His brother Ben and I went up to Orange Friday the 29th and packed up all the junk Nathan has accumulated over the long stay.
He had more junk than anyone realized. It almost didn’t fit in the Explorer!
We spent the night at Motel 6 then took off to take him home the next morning.
We left around 9 or so in the morning and took our time for the long drive.
It sure was a nice drive this time though. No hurry to get there and no hurry to get back home late at night either.
Driving 100 miles is not my idea of fun but it seemed fun on the final trip.
Nathan got to see things like new buildings, different scenery, the ocean, boats out there, new stores, things he hadn’t seen in so long.
His first day here was kinda weird though. He was coming home to a new place he had never seen before and it was a little strange.
Ben stayed the night in Nathan’s room on an airbed but Nathan didn’t have a good night. He couldn’t sleep laying down flat. His back muscles hurt.
I hadn’t anticipated that.
Ben moved him into the living room about 4 a.m. and he slept there.
That is where he has been since then too.
It seems to be working well for him and its ok for us too. We have 2 other couches in this big living room, so no problems finding a place to sit to watch tv.
It took Nathan a couple of days to get used to this place but he’s fine now.
He can walk just a little but not very well or very far and definitely cannot let go of that walker yet.
We got the shower, get dressed with my help thing down pretty fast and its really not a problem for either of us.
I found out he has had a real problem with yeast infections for a long time and the hospital was not treating it very efffectively.
I got Clotrimazole cream and its working very well. Most of it has cleared up and he says it feels much better.
His new doctor says that is a very good yeast infection treatment and to keep it up. He also told us that the reason it hurt Nathan to try to sleep flat is because his breathing muscles are not strong and I know from being Asthmatic that you can’t sleep laying flat if you are not breathing right.
I guess its a good thing we have a recliner.
I’ve been taking him shopping a lot to replace the clothes the hospital bleached and to get him out.
We have fun shopping together anyway. We always did.
His brother Ben is coming down this weekend to help with Nathans computer set up and spend time with him playing video games. They have fun together and its so nice to have us all together sometimes.
We are getting PT here at home twice weekly and will be for quite a while.
We have Nathan wheel down the ramp,out the gate and walk in front of the house with his walker. He is doing very well but gets very tired quickly.
I got him an ankle brace for his right ankle which turned under pretty far and I found him Vans high tops in size 15 to go over them and add extra support.
His legs have a long way to go but we hope he will be ok eventually.
His muscles are not visible much yet but just the fact that he walks at all is amazing to us all, including his PT guy.
I have started him on Lecithin, B Complex, Folic Acid, Echinacea and other vitamins that the hospital would not let him have unless a doctor wrote it out as a prescription and that never happened.
I figure anything to help is worth it. I am also feeding him much healthier food than he got there too. He is enjoying it.
Nate is very happy to be home and we’re very happy that he can be home.
It was a long hard painful 9 mos for all.
Trudy, natesmom