Hello faithful family, friends, and followers. Thank you once again for joining us here and for your faithful compassion and prayers. The past few days have seen a road trip of contrasts and today’s long awaited appointment with the neuro-ophthalmologist. I’ll start with today and then jump back to the roadtrip.
In someways, largely because of the healing of Joy’s vertical diplopia, the visit today was somewhat anticlimactic although very important in confirming Joy’s remaining vision challenges, the general health of her eyes, and considerations for the future. In general, Joy’s eye’s are physically healthy with some evidence of early cataracts which had been noted in previous eye exams. Because of her aphasia, Joy had some difficulty communicating with the physician during the vision exam, for example, was she not recognizing letters or was she saying the wrong letters at times because of the aphasia. But it would appear that the best Joy can focus is 20/30 for distance vision with or without glasses. In both eyes the optic nerve looked ok, the retinas were attached and healthy, and her ocular pressures were normal.
But as the physician said, the most important part of our visit was the assessment of Joy’s field of vision cut. And, as was suspected, Joy has a complete field of vision cut in the upper right quadrant of both eyes, due to her brain damage. It was not surprising based on what Joy has been experiencing, but nonetheless hard to hear at the same time. One positive note is that with the loss limited to the right upper quadrant, if Joy is ever able to drive again, the vision loss would not prevent that. We were thankful to have the very thorough assessment of Joy’s eyes and appreciated the neuro-ophthalmologist’s patience and kindness toward Joy throughout the exam process which took well over an hour.
But our other major milestone of the past few days was our roadtrip to visit Joy’s mother in northeastern Iowa, a night in a hotel, and one of our most favorite things, driving back along the Mississippi River for our trip home. In many ways, the trip was such a miracle that we both kept expressing our joy, our thanks to God, and thanks for all the prayers and support that made it possible throughout the trip. The “normalcy” of some of our favorite things which we had not been sure we would ever experience again, brought tears of joy to our eyes more than once during the trip. We left Sunday morning and drove directly to Joy’s mother’s assisted living apartment and then took her out to lunch where we were joined by Joy’s brother Dan and his wife Valeria who live in the area. It was another wonderful reunion for mother and daughter, the second of which neither thought may ever happen again this side of heaven. After lunch we returned to Ruth’s apartment for some wonderful time together and then we headed for our hotel in Prairie du Chien, WI. We enjoyed a lovely walk by the river, dinner, and a restful night. Then Monday, we enjoyed one of our favorite pastimes, driving along the beautiful bluffs along the Mississippi on our way back home, stopping for lunch at a favorite restaurant with patio seating overlooking Lake Pepin, in Lake City, MN. It was wonderful, yet it also brought into focus the contrasts of past and present realities.
On our trip down, at one point we were in the midst of farms and cornfields and Joy blurted out, “Oh their police are bad, their police are down!” Not seeing anything obvious I responded with, “I don’t think you mean police, did you see some corn blown down,” as I pointed at the cornfield we were driving by. She said, “No, it was, it was…” Just then we came up to a grove of trees and she pointed at the trees and said, “What are those called?” I said, “Trees.” And she said, “Their trees were down, the trees were down.” That’s just one example of something that happens all the time but which highlights Joy’s continued significant struggle with aphasia. Joy works so hard at communicating and is doing an absolutely amazing job, but I have to say it still breaks my heart when she points to trees and says, “What are those called?” Still, despite the contrasts, and at times because of them, we had a wonderful time basking in God’s goodness of the healing and restoration he has given us.
So you already know this part. We ask you to join with us in thanks and praise to God for the continued healing and restoration of so much of life we never thought we’d ever experience again. At the same time, we plead with you for your prayers for miraculous healing of Joy’s field of vision cut and of her aphasia and apraxia. As I’ve said many times before words cannot begin to express how thankful and how indebted we are to you for your faithful prayers and compassionate support. Please keep up the good work ❤️!
