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Grieving the Loss of Strength
Every day Steve is showing remarkable improvement in his stroke recovery. Yesterday he walked 50 ft. with the cane assisted by one therapist. Their goal for him is to walk 150 ft.
He’s trying very hard to work the left arm, and today they hooked it up to some electrodes to stimulate his muscles. His said it felt like bugs crawling up his arm, not like the “electric chair” experience he expected.
He is off all IVs now so they’re really working his arm. He’s had a few sobering and emotional moments when he realized the lack of strength in his arm. He tried to make his arm move, but it just doesn’t want to obey his brain. He broke 
down and cried in therapy today as he tried to do a simple exercise of moving his arm back and forth with his hand on a small skateboard. He just wonders where all his strength went. He always had such powerful strong arms from pounding all those nails throughout his building career. He needs times of grieving those losses, but he can’t continue to live in the past. From now on he must not look back, but press on ahead to the goal. Easy for me to say, hard for him to do.
I stayed home yesterday just to get some rest while my daughters, Pam, Jennifer, and Stephanie covered for me, and I feel energized today.
We were informed today that Steve will be discharged late next week. I misunderstood that Medicare would pay for Bellin Rehab as long as he needed therapy. But they will pay for Inpatient Rehab only while it is “medically necessary”. Since they no longer consider it necessary for him to be in an inpatient rehab facility, they determine that it’s more cost effective for them to have him move to a skilled nursing facility to get the rehab. Between Medicare and the supplemental insurance that we have, they will pay for 100 days at a nursing home with a rehab unit if he goes there right from Bellin. So now we need to find the right facility where Steve would feel comfortable and where he will get the therapy and care that he needs to prepare him to come home. A couple of people “in the know” are helping us. Even though Bellin gave us a list, we must still visit each one to see for ourselves. And then there must be a vacancy for a private room available.
Please pray according to the scriptures below that God will go before us to prepare the way and direct us to the right facility. Thanks so much.
Love, Kathy
“The LORD himself goes before you and will be with you; he will never leave you nor forsake you. Do not be afraid; do not be discouraged.” Deuteronomy 31:8
“…the LORD went before them in the three days’ journey, to search out a resting place for them.” Numbers 10:33