Day 1000 – Grayson’s Journey

Dear family and friends

It is unbelievable that it has been 1000 days since I listened to that voice mail on my cell phone. I had just landed at Dallas-Fort Worth en route, or so I thought, to Philadelphia. I turned on my cell phone and listened to my messages. The first one was time stamped at almost the same time my plane took off earlier that day from Burbank. That message was from the Glendale Police Department informing me that Grayson had suffered a life threatening event and was being transported to the Glendale Adventist Medical Center. We were still taxiing to the terminal and I called Regina to see if this was some sort of mistake. Sadly I realized that it was not. Regina also received a call and met up with Grayson in the ER. At this point the medical professionals knew little and we had to take things minute by minute. By the time my plane reached the terminal, I was already on the phone with travel to book me back home. My work could wait.

I was scared. However, as scary as this was, we had been through something like this before in 2004 and Grayson was back on his feet in just a few days. The eternal optimist in me knew that this would probably end the same way and life would be back to normal in a week or so.

I couldn’t have been more wrong.

If you have been following this blog even the slightest, Grayson’s life as we knew it ended forever that day. He is no longer the independent, brilliant, articulate young man that we knew. While he has had a significant physical recovery, his cognitive deficits require him to be supervised during all of his waking hours. He is mostly non-verbal, has no short-term memory, and his fine motor skill deficits have left him unable to write, use a keyboard or tie his shoes. Yet we are blessed that his basic personality was left intact – he is loving, affectionate and wants to please. Just think how much worse this could have been if he were angry and uncooperative. At 6’2” tall that would be a real challenge.

Our lives were also forever changed that day. We went from empty-nesters to full-time caregivers. Retirement plans have been placed on hold indefinitely (assuming that our employers don’t have different ideas). We are now advocates for Grayson’s ongoing health needs, and legal conservators for him. While he could benefit from therapy – physical, occupational and speech – the measureable gain over time is insufficient for the insurance world to warrant the staggering investment in him. So we do the best we can. And before we decry the insurance companies, they have already spent roughly a million dollars to get Grayson to where he is today after his incident. While I may wish that health insurance carried a “take care of you forever” clause, none do. Their contract with you is to patch you up the best that they can, then you are on your own.

So as I was told the day after the incident, this is a marathon and not a sprint. We have just completed the first mile - 25 remaining. With God’s help we will carry on!

Pax!

Brant