Sunday evening

A few more steps towards recovery today - and a reminder that Matt has a really long, slow road ahead. They took out his central line today because he's only on his sedation medication and one IV at this point which they could put in his left hand. He's having some circulation issues in his right arm - his hand is big and puffy - and there's a chance the central line was causing some of this issue. We'll see how that clears up tomorrow.

I thought that they were going to do a tracheostomy tomorrow, too, to get his breathing tube out, but the nurse this evening said that they might wait a few more days to see if they can get him off the respirator completely without having to do another surgery. That would be nice, but I can tell he's really frustrated and sick of that tube.

We talked about his neuro responses and she said they were the same - he's responding to commands on his left side and randomly moving his right arm. She said that it could be days before we see the next sign of improvement and days after that before the next. Patience is a virtue that I must develop.

One last thing - he opened his right eye and followed me this evening! He watched as I sat down beside him and moved his eye to see when someone else came up beside me. Then he closed his eye again and fell asleep - I'm sure it gives him a headache since he can't focus on anything right now.