It’s hard to explain in words the feeling you get in your gut regarding any bad news regarding your child. You question your faith, and if there was anything you could have done to prevent this tragedy. You drive your self crazy hoping against hope that all will turn out fine and you find yourself making deals with God to end this tragedy. But when it’s all over and done, your still left with one big unanswered question…WHY?
Remember, unless you purposely caused this to happen, you can’t blame yourself for what happened. Use the time to help your loved one. Pity parties will get you nowhere and just make things worse. Lean on any family members, cry your heart out (privately) and just keep on praying for the best outcome.
Jason stayed in a coma for 6 weeks and awoke in a unresponsive manner. What could we do? First, most traumatic brain injuries affect the sight of your patient. It’s almost like shutting off and rebooting your computer. the brain reacts differently with each patient, but the likely hood of damage is high. If your patient is blankly staring up in a daze, it’s time to get those eyes rebooted. Purchase a Lazer Pointer from any office supply store, and remember to never point it at anybodies eye directly. Next darken the room a bit and start pointing the lazer up at the cieling and SLOWLY move the light across the cieling back and forth , up and down, side to side…SLOWLY. Their eyes may not track in the begining and may take several days before you may achieve any results, but the mind remembers and results will come with persistance and patience. The four muscles in each eye must get stronger and stimulating the pupils with movement will help. Extra batteries and sore wrist will be the norm, but this is the first step in helping instead of not knowing what to do. By the way, Music or television also help stimulate the brain so leave them on. And one other thing you may be asking yourself is, why is the patient sleeping so long? Well, the body has expeienced a shock to the system and REST is the best thing that can happen so that the body can heal.
Last but most important, get used to a new medical term called “Range of Motion”. this is streatching and SLOWLY moving the limbs of the body to simulate movement. We can’t have the body stay in one position for any long period of time, so an inflatable constantly moving hospital bed is nessasary. Bed sore are a very dangerous condition that can be avoided with proper Range of Motion. Check with your doctor and find out if limited range of motion is advisable, taking into account any broken bones, fractures or neck injuries. The hospital staff should be more than happy to show you the proper movements and don’t forget that everyone love a soft gentle massage from time to time. make your paitient as comfortable as possible.
When we post our next section, we will explain other procedures and helpful hints to make this tragedy go a lot easier for the both of you. And remember…It was Not your fault, and things will get better with knowledge and prayer on your side. Good luck.