The End of the Day

The end has been just as good as the beginning today. Dick has been very active. He has responded to questions like how many kids do you have, how many grandchildren, sisters, and brothers. He has answered them all by holding up the correct amount of fingers. He has shown his sense of humor by telling Amy when she asked if he would open his eye for her that he was a little busy right now and then giving her a bit of a grin. He had his leg hanging off of the bed and I told him that he needed to put it back up so he doesn't get swelling and he pointed his finger at me and when I told him not to give me any guff he actually flipped me off-- his favorite sister-in-law (sorry, Jan & Kath, author's prerogative). We are happy to see these signs of his old self. They tied a hand exerciser on his bed this afternoon and when we return from dinner at 8:00p we found out that he had been in trouble. He had used the exerciser to pull himself down to the end of his bed and was trying to get his legs off of the bed when the nurse discovered how far down in the bed he had actually scooted. We have warned them that he won't be a good patient. He wants to do everything and he wants to do everything now! They do expect that he should go to the step down floor sometime at the beginning of next week. He is doing so good so fast, I know that he and all of us will be glad when he can have the trach removed from his throat so he can talk. Although, Amy is quite good at deciphering his hand signals and reading his lips I am totally at a loss. He gets frustrated that I don't understand him. I guess that is why I am number one. But without pointing it out to him, he is number one in my book too.