At the Rehab Center

Fred has been sharing a room in rehab with a man who is in there because he had a stroke and can’t use his right arm and hand. R. is around sixty, I think, and today the EMTs came in and he was carried off to the hospital. In the month R. has been sharing a room with Fred, I had noticed that R. was a bit picky about his food. He had to have his food cut up for him and he ate maybe half of what he was given. But in the last week, he has been refusing food. Two days ago, I heard him tell his wife he had a stomach ache. He has also developed a hacking cough. In fact it was so bad that Fred pressed his call  button last night to get someone to look at R. This morning R. was put on oxygen and the nurse brought the results of the tests the doctor ordered to go to the hospital with the EMTs. I hope all goes well for him but I fear he has given up …

Then there is Fred. He is eating well {and the food is not at all bad}. He is really working very hard with the physical therapists and almost every day I come in, he has some small but important improvement to tell me about. {The one that made both of us laugh was when the therapist held the end of a black theraband above his shoulder for him to pull on, and he pulled so hard, he broke the theraband!} He likes his physical therapy people and they obviously like him. I like them, too. They don’t treat him as a "patient’" per se but as a person with whom they are working to improve some physical problems he has. They listen to what he has to say.

Give thanks for unknown blessings already on their way.

– Native American prayer

And the day came when the risk to remain tight in a bud was more painful than the risk it took to blossom.

– Anaïs Nin