Two Steps Forward, One Step Back

People always say "No news is good news." But often it is exactly the opposite. Sometimes, you don't hear from others because it is taking every minute they have just to deal with, and cope with their challenging lives.

My brother had a huge setback as soon as I left Seattle...after my full week of staying there, and being with him as much as 6 hours in a day. And as you can imagine...I did not sit by quietly. I did everything I knew how to do, spiritually, energetically, with healing touch, and constant talk to pull, pull, pull him out of the coma and back to us. I got him to look me in the eyes, to nod his head 'yes' or 'no' to some, but not all questions and I most of all...I got him to smile. Over and over his stared into my heart and smiled. And I loved it. But as my week came to an end, I had to return to my own home in Salem, praying he could just hold on to his progress and maintain his steadily improving state of health. It did not last. And it breaks my heart that it did not.

First he had a huge seizure the very next day. It took the doctors a full 45 minutes to get it to stop. That is not good. Not good at all. Previous to that he had not had a single seizure in a week and a half. Then day before yesterday, he had 27 seizures in one single 24 hour period. The doctors at Harborview Medical Center, in Seattle, do not understand why this is all happening, but are doing every thing they know how to do.

I cannot help but wish I was still up there, still encouraging him, still talking to him and sending him positive healing energies and prayers, but I needed to return to help with my almost 97 yer old MIL who was also taken to the hospital and had to undergo surgery and then a battle to find a single care home that would accept her. Her current one said she was "too ill" for them, the next one said "she was not ill enough to require 'skilled' nursing care.

Finally, Providence Benedictine in Mt. Angel OR accepted her and she had several more days of IV drips and physical therapy in order to be able to use her legs and hands a bit, and is doing well there, and getting stronger. Our goal is to get her strong enough that it will only take one person to move her in and out of bed, so that her small adult care home will accept her back without having to hire a second helper just for her, at our expense. As much as she may complain there, she considers it her home and we need her healthy and strong in order to be able to return!

It is all so challenging, and it is just one thing after another after another!

Please continue to keep my brother, Douglas Savikko, of Eagle River, Alaska..and his wife, Rebecca Savikko, who not only needs the donation of an O+ kidney with high antibodies titers, but fell and broke her hip, in the hospital, while walking with a nurse, and has since had hip surgery..a plate and three screws....in your thoughts and prayers. We are hoping to move Becky south to Portland, where she can live with her oldest daughter and her family as we go through so many challenges with Doug. And we will then take turns, driving her up to Seattle to see her husband, my brother, Doug, on weekends when she is not having dialysis, herself.

Please pray or send positive thoughts to ALL of the members of my entire family. We continue to care for our 86 almost 87 year old mother in our childhood home on Douglas Island, near Juneau, Alaska. Now, in her 7th year of Alzheimer's, I was expected in early August to return 'home' and give my brothers and sisters-in-law a break by being the 24 hr. 'live-in' care giver. I was placed in a horrible position of prioritizing crises, and since 2 brothers and one super hard working sister-in-law, live in the area and can continue to help out so that the current brother and his family, who moved in with my mom could take a much needed, and deserved vacation to see the wife's parents in Fairbanks. It is all so challenging...for ALL of us. So many of us, and our families are in this dramatic sandwich generation ...only now it's cross directionally....up, down, and sideways....in the sandwich!!!

Thank you and bless you for your comments and prayers. This post will remain as the update site and I will get a badge over on the side bar for connection with it under "Praying for a Miracle along with the other posts.

Thank so much!

PS
I will be posting on other things, for my sake, and my readers sake today, and tomorrow but keeping all of my thoughts and prayers with so many that I love as I do so, trust me!

photo:
Rebecca and Doug, at my parents home, Douglas Island, Alaska 2005.

Latest Update on Praying for a Miracle
Praying for a Miracle
Crisis
Providence Alaska Medical Center
Providence, Divine and Otherwise
Song of the Hills and an Air Flight Medevac to Seattle
Salem to Sisters to Seattle
One Miracle at a Time
Two Steps Forward, One Step Back

Michele Bilyeu blogs With Heart and Hands as she shares a quilting journey through her life in Salem, Oregon and Douglas, Alaska and all of her AAQI Quilting. Sharing thousands of links to Free Quilt and Quilt Block Patterns and encouraging others to join in the Liberated Quilting Challenge and make or donate small art quilts to the Alzheimer's Art Quilt Initiative (AAQI) Help us change the world, one little quilt at a time!