Hello faithful family, friends, and followers. This past week has seen some of the darkest and most challenging days Joy has had in her healing journey, while at the same time some of the most encouraging days to date. Your ongoing interest, compassion, and prayers continue to buoy and encourage us especially through the down times. It is hard to say exactly what triggered Joy’s dark days at the start of the week, but nonetheless she struggled with the state of her recovery, her many limitations despite many gains, and her repeated mention of the long road ahead. As usually happens, one of the triggers for Joy’s low points is difficulty recognizing words, concepts, people, and things. What may cause these seeming setbacks is anyone’s guess, but they hit Joy hard. However, we thank God and all of you for your prayers that we made it through, “the valley of the shadow of death” (figuratively), and turned what felt like was a significant corner.
While I had shared some of the details, including pictures and video, of her hospitalization and long journey to healing, we had not systematically gone through the whole history from the beginning. So, at Joy’s request, and while it may seem counterintuitive, we began going through all the CaringBridge posts from the start. As I read the history and showed Joy the pictures and videos, by God’s grace, it actually seemed to have a transformative effect on her mood and demeanor. Rather than growing more discouraged, she grew more encouraged with recognizing the gains she has made, and repeatedly expressed thanks to God for his healing hand throughout the journey. She also tearfully expressed awe, wonder, and appreciation for all of you who have so faithfully supported her and our family. Joy is just grasping the scope of support, compassion and faithful intercession that has gone on since the beginning of this saga. She very deeply wants everyone reading this to know how appreciative she is for the faithful prayers and support you have all provided.
We’ve worked through a few posts each day and viewed the comments, talked about the events surrounding the posts and my observations of Joy’s realty at the time versus hers, which was largely nonexistent. Joy states she remembers very little if any of the events we are reading about in Florida. While we haven’t reached those posts yet in the history, at this point her memory starts with leaving the hospital in Florida, boarding the plane for home, the flight, and the transfer to the hospital here. We’ll see if more Florida memories are triggered as we continue through the remaining time there.
Joy’s mood had started to shift and then was buoyed by a special friend visit on Wednesday and a good day of therapy Thursday. Thursday was her final assessment for physical therapy, at least for this round of orders, with our last session coming this Tuesday. Joy’s assessment showed that in walking distance, speed, and balance, she is outdoing the average in all measures for healthy peers her age. While I wasn’t surprised, it was a welcome affirmation and an encouragement to Joy in validating the progress she has made so far. We have scheduled a couple of single overnight roadtrips in the coming weeks to test out Joy’s progress and endurance and the plans have excited us both. We also have more times planned with friends and family and continue to work on how life will look as we wind down each of the therapies for the time being.
We praise and thank God and all of you for Joy’s healing to date, but would still plead for ongoing faithfulness in your prayers. Joy’s vertical diplopia appears to have healed, for which we are thankful beyond words, however, she still has the significant right field of vision cut for which we ask your ongoing intercession. Joy has made significant progress in word recognition, but can still find herself struggling with some of the most simple words depending on the day and her level of fatigue. Concepts and understanding of how many things work still has a long way to go even as many gains have been made. We thank you and again ask you to stay faithful in your thoughts and prayers for Joy and our family. I pray that Joy’s new awareness and inexpressible appreciation for your overwhelming support will help encourage you to continue with us in this marathon we are all running.