Rolling along

Things continue to roll right along in the Jackson household. Kathleen, Sherry's new assistant, is doing a wonderful job. She has turned out to be as caring and enthusiastic as we thought she would be. She has really taken to the role of in home "therapist" and gives Sherry a good workout on a daily basis. It also turns out that she is a hairdresser and has agreed to cut our hair for a very reasonable fee. Brittney was first up and had her hair cut last week, she looks great.

On Saturday my sister Kim came and picked us all up and took us to Florence for lunch at the Driftwood Shores. The drive over was pretty nasty with much wind and rain and the roads soaked with water. However, when we arrived in town the sun had broken through and provided us a great view of the ocean as we ate our lunch. We are planning an overnight trip there at the end of March. We have not really travelled at all since Sherry came home just about a year ago. We hope to do more of it in the future. It felt good to get out of town for awhile.

Well, enough for now,

I love my wife....tomorrow we move forward,

Dean

Good things

Sherry's new assistant started on Monday. We are very excited to welcome Kathleen to Sherry's team. She has several years of care providing experience and is looking forward to playing the role of in home therapist as well. We all feel as if this is a good tme to "kick things up a notch" as far as the therapy work Sherry does at home. Kathleen is very enthuiastic and Sherry feels very comfortable with her, they seem to get along great.

I also wanted to take this time to thank Jody once again for all of her hard work and patience. She constantly went above and beyond the call of duty and did pretty much whatever we needed done. We wish her the best of luck with her new job. Sherry is looking forward to being just a "mother in law" again. I think it is fair to say however, that Sherry and Jody have become much closer during all of this. As Martha Stewert would say..."that's a good thing."

Big things....little things

The last week or so has been a story of big things that will have a huge affect on the way we live our lives and of little things that offer a hint at what may be possible for our future. First, the big news. Jody, our care provider for about one year now has decided to move on to another job that better suits the needs of her and her family. She has done such a good job for us, providing the caring and trust that can maybe only come from a relative. She has gone above and beyond her official job duties and has made life so much easier for us. She has endured the stress that comes with life with Jackson family, always trying to be helpful with her actions and advice. We will miss her and wish her well in her new job.

So, we are now looking for someone special, someone looking for a rewarding challenge as well as a paycheck. We are asking all of you that keep up with this blog and our website to help us find that special person. If any of you out there know of anyone who does care provider work and might be a good fit for our family, please give them the address of our website www.sherrysjourney.com. Ask them to visit and explore the site. Remind them to go back and read the blog from the start, watch the videos (especially the ones of Sherry in therapy), read the "sherrys_journey" page of the website which tells the story of what happened to Sherry. This should give anyone interested some very good insight into what this job will be all about. I have also added a job description page to the site as well. Your help will be greatly appreciated.

Now for the little things. Sherry is making very good progress with getting dressed. She is doing better with the lower extremities but still struggles with putting on her tops. We are putting much more effort into this recently and it is paying off. I have stopped "giving" Sherry her medicine every night. Now she brings out a glass of water to her dresser, puts it down and gets her own medicine. I put her to the test and put three or four bottles of pills in front of her. Two are hers and two are not. She is getting pretty good about picking up a bottle, reading it and figuring out if it hers, or say, Chelsea's. She is good about checking how many pills she needs. She is then able to open the child proof cap and get out the correct number of pills. She probably could have started doing this some time ago, but we get into a rut sometimes of doing things for her when we should not. She is not yet ready to do it totally on her own, but she will be able to in time.

Tonight, a short time after Sherry had gone to bed I looked toward the bedroom door to see the light on. I walked in and she was sitting on the edge of the bed putting lotion on her dry feet. She realized she had a problem, got up turned the light on and found the lotion, took the cap off, put it on her feet, put the cap back on, put the lotion away and eventually went back to bed. Not more than two nights ago she called me to do it all for her. It is a little thing, I know, but it is progress. I truely feel it will be little a thing stacked on top of another little thing, stacked on top of yet another little thing that will evenually get us to where we want to be. We see new "little things" almost every day.

enough for now,

I love my wife....tomorrow we move forward,

Dean