11/30 update

So, today was day 2 of rehab for Dad.  Mom and I visited him twice today to see how things were going.  Yesterday, Dad had rehab scattered all throughout the day.  Today they switched it up to put all of his therapy in a short time period and then let him rest for the remainder of the day.  His case worker said they were doing "co-therapies", and from what we understand they put the occupational and physical therapists with him at the same time to keep him active and alert as long as they could before letting him rest.  From his schedule on their board, it looks like he was with them for about 2 1/2 hours before we arrived.  When we got there, Dad was in his wheelchair sitting right across from the nurses station.  They wanted to keep a close eye on him after yesterday!  He was kind of fidgety and a little grumpy, and we figured he was worn out from all the rehab he had just finished.  The nurse got him back into bed, and he fell asleep almost instantly. But before he went to bed, we gave him a card Barb and Bill sent, and he opened it and READ IT OUT LOUD!  We were pretty excited to hear that.  We have been wondering if words look jumbled to him or not, so now we know that he can see and understand the words!

After the nurse got him back into bed Mom and I left, had some lunch and did some errands, and went back late this afternoon to try to be there for dinner time.  When we arrived, the staff had already offered him dinner, and he apparently refused.  Mom wasn't too thrilled with that, especially since we know he didn't have dinner last night, so she hunted down the nurse who brought back a few things for Dad to nibble on.  With us sitting there he ate just about all of it, so we think our new plan is to skip the afternoon visits, so we stay out of the therapists' way, and be there when it's time for dinner.  We know he's so tired after his early therapy, and probably doesn't want to get out of bed again in order to eat.  But we want him to be eating as much as he can on his own so we can get rid of the feeding tube.  They're not using it at all now, but they won't take it out til they are confident he'll continue to eat enough on his own.

We had a good visit after he ate.  We watched a little tv together and chatted.  He seemed to be talking a bit louder, and was mostly making sense.  He does still drift off and mumble some, but it's getting better all the time.