January 18, 2016. I drove to my office in Houston and worked until my lunchtime, at which time I left Houston for Temple. While I was in transit, Brenda stopped by for Dad’s physical therapy session. She suggested that they practice a car transfer, but he told her that he was done with practicing the car transfer. He had transferred in and out of the car several times. Brenda didn’t know it, but we had not always adhered to her guidelines, so she probably didn’t realize that Dad had hit the streets for doctors’ appointments and haircuts following his first successful attempt. However, knowing Dad as she did, she wouldn’t have been too surprised. Dad could be very determined, not to mention stubborn. It was a Locke family trait. Instead of car transfers, Brenda had him work on his balance.

When I arrived at my parents’ home in Temple, Kristen, the speech therapist, was reviewing the dos and don’ts about eating and swallowing. While she was there, I showed her some foods that I had purchased in Houston, which included canned nectars and tomato basil soup. Based on some earlier conversations with Kristen, I had guessed that they qualified as thickened liquids, and she agreed.

For dinner, Mom prepared a chicken and biscuit dinner, and for dessert we had angel food cake, topped with a homemade mixed-berry jam. It seemed that we had deviated somewhat from the “avoid meals of white and red” guideline so that we could distinguish blood from aspirated food in his trach, but we didn’t care. We were pleased that we were able to prepare meals that we could all enjoy together. Just a few weeks ago, Dad would retreat to his bedroom while we ate, coming out when it was time to play Oh Hell. We played the card game again tonight, and Dad won.

While Dad was getting ready for bed, I learned that since I had left on Friday, he had started dressing himself.

Before I went to bed, I needed to move my car from the front of the house to the side of the garage. While I was outside, I noticed a large stack of boxes beside the garage. It seemed that UPS had left my order from American HomePatient out of sight of the street and out of our sight too. After using the hand truck to haul everything inside, I unpacked the boxes and saw that they neglected again to send us the saline and 4x4s gauze sponges that I had ordered two orders ago. These supplies were vital for trach care and I had resorted to having the nurses to bring me gauze sponges during their visits.

January 19. Dad had a very good night, waking only once at 3:00 A.M. to use the Yankauer suction wand. When he woke an hour later, he was in a good mood and had a pretty good morning. He and Michell were ready and waiting for the HOP bus when it arrived early at 5:40 A.M.

When they arrived at the dialysis center, Dad weighed in at 66.4 kg. Because his target weight was 63 kg (139 lbs), the dialysis nurse said that they would remove 4800 ml of fluid. Michell had experienced the last time that the dialysis center removed too much fluid. She strongly objected to this news and had the nurse lower the target to 1800 ml. Michell had changed a lot since she first joined us. In November, she had been shocked when I objected to the guidance of the wound specialist. Now, just two months later, she was standing up to the medical professionals. At the end of his dialysis session, Dad weighed 64.8 kg.

After Dad and Michell returned home, I contacted Sue, our friend and the nurse practitioner at the dialysis center, and questioned her about Dad’s target dry weight. Unlike most of their dialysis patients, Dad needed to gain weight. I was trying my best to get Dad to eat more, yet the dialysis center maintained 63 kg target weight for a 6’1” male. Sue agreed that his case was not typical, and increased his dry weight to 64 kg.

While Sue and I were talking, she told me that Dr. Issac, the nephrologist, wanted to talk with Dad about removing the dialysis port and replacing it with either a fistula or graft. She said that she would schedule an appointment for Dad to see Dr. Jaffers, the surgeon. When I told Dad about the call and the possible surgery options, he seemed to become very depressed. It became clear to me that I did a poor job of presenting this information to him in a positive light, and I spent quite a bit of time trying to convince him that he was doing very well and was making great progress. After talking myself blue in the face, I agreed to drop the subject for today. My parents had been determined that Dad would recover to the point that he would not require dialysis. I suspected that surgery to provide a permanent dialysis vessel was a bit disheartening and not what he wanted to hear.

We played Oh Hell after dinner, and Michell won. Dad still seemed a little down, but not as much as earlier. After Dad had gone to bed, Mom thanked me for what I had said to him earlier today, but I don’t think that anything that I said to him had had any effect. She disagreed and thought that he’d feel better tomorrow.

I wondered to myself if it would help if I told him that I believed that he was on day 258 of a 296-day journey, which meant that he was 87% of the way to being better.

January 20. From what I could hear, Dad slept in until 7:00 A.M. I had meetings that started around 4:30 A.M., and couldn’t take a break from work until 10:00 A.M. I took that opportunity to change Dad’s trach, two days past my self-imposed seven-day cadence. The change went well, and Michell noticed that his stoma was becoming smaller. Svenja, the trach nurse, had switched Dad to a smaller sized trach to enable the stoma to begin healing, and it seemed to be working.

At 11:20 A.M., Brenda and the shower tech, Pam, stopped by so that Michell could learn how to apply the shower shield to Dad’s dialysis port and how to help him transfer in and out of the shower. During the process, Dad also got to take a shower. Dad and his shower helpers were finished with Dad’s shower within 30 minutes, and Michell was certified to assist Dad with showers. After Pam left, Brenda spent the remainder of Dad’s physical therapy time working on his walking and balance.

After his lunch of ham and turkey on an English muffin, Dad and Mom worked on some of their finances while I worked. The office seemed just a tad smaller with the three of us in such tight quarters.

At the stroke of 2:00 P.M., Kristen arrived for Dad’s swallow therapy. As she was getting ready to leave, Dianne arrived to relieve Michell. Usually, the aides switched out around 10:00 A.M., but because Michell had had car trouble last week and arrived a few hours late, she had told Dianne that she would stay late today.

Shortly after Dianne arrived, Mom went to the grocery store. When she returned, Mom, Dad, and I got into the car and drove to the church. I was still intent on taking Dad back to church on Valentine’s Day, and I thought that we needed at least one practice run. During the ride there, I shared my plan for his recovery and how I believed that by the time the 296 days were up (148 days of hospitalization and 148 days of home care), he would be ready to be mainstreamed. We all agreed on a plan, but he added that he wanted to end the live-in aides in three weeks. I told him that if he used them to help him exercise, we could terminate our relationship with One On One Personal Home Care. As long as we had the aides, we might as well get out money’s worth from them. He seemed to be onboard. I hoped that this little talk would inspire him to exercise more.

At the church, Dad got out of the car, and we walked part of the way to the door. He became a little winded, but we still had enough time to practice a couple more times before the big day.

For dinner, we ate spaghetti, still one of my favorite comfort foods, and then Dad beat us at Oh Hell.

January 21. Dad woke up at 3:30 A.M. to use the toilet and was ready to get up, but his plans were dashed when Dianne told him that he would stay in bed for another 30 minutes.

Mom was up before 4:00 A.M., and I met her in the kitchen when I made coffee. With the assistance of his walker, Dad went into the closet to select his clothes, and then he dressed himself. After dressing, he wheeled himself into the kitchen and joined Mom for a cup of hot water, which he referred to as weak coffee. Her coffee was somewhat stronger.

When he finished his breakfast of Cream of Wheat and honey, with a peach on the side, I administered his morning meds and trach care. We negotiated the morning routine like a well-oiled machine, and the HOP bus arrived moments after 6:00 A.M.

While Dad and Dianne were at the dialysis center, I called Gale. I subtly implored her to return for one or two rotations. We would be ending our relationship with One on One Personal Homecare Services soon, and I wanted to see her again, if not for work, then for dinner. Gale would not commit to returning to work, but she agreed to come back for dinner. To get the rotation of aides to align with when I wanted to host dinner for Michell and Gale, I might need to get Michell to stay for a two-week stint. I didn’t want to hurt Dianne’s feelings by excluding her from the dinner, but Michell and Gale were by far our favorite aides.

Dad weighed 66.4 kg when he arrived at the dialysis center. After having 2200 ml of fluid removed, he left weighing 64.4 kg. Dianne and Dad returned home at 11:20 A.M.

We had turkey sandwiches and Fig Newtons for lunch, and then Dad took a nap. After the loss of 2200 ml of fluid, he was feeling pretty punk. He said that he’d rather not gain weight if it meant having so much fluid removed. I explained that we’d work with Sue to ensure that they gradually increased his dry weight. She had just adjusted it a couple of days ago, so it seemed a bit premature to ask for another adjustment.

After sleeping for a couple of hours, he started feeling a little better, and by happy hour he was feeling more like his normal self. After dinner, we played cards, and I was tonight’s big winner. We were finished with cards and starting our nighttime routine at 7:50 P.M. Within 30 minutes, he was in bed and sleeping, and he slept well all night.