Larry's settling into his routine pretty well now that he's home - maybe a little too well. He's not enthusiastic about doing his therapy exercises, to the point where both the PT and the OT have pretty much signed off on coming to the house anymore because Larry's "not making any progress". I think there are a lot of reasons for this, and I think that getting him back into an outpatient setting for the therapy may help. We have an appointment on Monday with his primary care doctor, who is the one that has to submit the referral request to set up the oupatient schedule for the various therapies (including speech, which he's had none of since he came home). I hope that I don't have to fight tooth and nail - again - to get this done...but if I do, I will.

In the meantime, Larry is sleeping late, then up in the wheelchair for a couple of hours, then napping in the afternoon and up again by the time I get home. He's sleeping so-so at night, but all told is probably sleeping at least 12 hours per day, maybe 14. He just does not want to do very much, although he perks up when I get home and likes sitting outside and having dinner with me. I try to walk every night with him, but there are many times when he won't go and puts up such a fuss that I can't take him out. I'm not sure why, because other nights he is very happy to get out. He seems content to just laze around all day, so getting him on a schedule where he has to leave the house a few times a week for therapy will probably be very good. I just hope that he doesn't fight it; once again, if he doesn't want to do it I can't make him.

The contractors have been working all week on the remodeling. They're here every day, but some days for only a few hours. Other days they're here until 8:00 at night. The original 10 day estimate has long since passed, as the size of the job has continued to expand, but they're making pretty good progress. The new floor is in, and the tile in the bathroom, and they've done some painting and other miscellaneous stuff. It's not fancy, but it's clean and new and makes the whole house a lot more wheelchair accessible, so I'm pretty happy with it. Larry seems to like it too. He enjoyed watching the contractors install the new slding door to his room today, especially when they almost dropped it. One of them told me that Larry yelled "careful" when he saw that happen; another of those "bingo!" word reflexes, I guess, but always good to hear him use a word.

So nothing is progressing as much (or as fast) as I'd like...once again I'm learning about PATIENCE - not my favorite thing - and trying to accept the true Californianess of it all and "go with the flow", but it's not my strong suit, to say the least. I'm wishing Larry was more motivated, and not sure what to do. I've tried guilt, and nagging, and cheerleading, and crying, and flash cards, and everything else I can come up with and he just doesn't seem to want to move forward. That's scary, because if he doesn't he is going to start backsliding and deteriorating, and I so do not want to see that happen.

I have a job offer that would be about 20% more pay than I get now (it would just about pay for Larry's caregiver), and would allow me to work from home a few days each week. I'm not enthusiastic about changing jobs when I'm already under a lot of stress, but we can sure use the money and I already have the office space at home, so I might do it. I'm thinking it over, anyway. Working from home might be great, or horrible, and I"m not sure which...the idea is interesting, though.

-Janine