Trish's Place

Our Baby Girl Has Arrived!!!

2011-11-13T17:49:00.011-07:00

My Husband Scott & I three weeks before she was born

Hi Everyone,

Well a lot has changed since my last posting. My family and I are happy to announce the arrival of our sweet little girl Savannah. I delivered her naturally on October 19th. Everything went great with my pregnancy and her delivery. I was even able to push her out like I did with my other two kids before I was hurt. It was a glorious experience! My doctor told me since my ab. muscles were strong now that it shouldn’t be a problem and it wasn’t. We are so happy that she is here and we are both very happy and healthy.

Right After She Was Born

Here is Savannah her first day of life

I worked out in physical therapy up until two weeks before she was born. I had to stop my walking as I got big because I got dizzy some because of all of the extra blood I had in my body because of the pregnancy. I also never wanted to risk falling while pregnant. I did continue to stand and do hip hikes the whole time though. I also continued to do the total gym to keep my arms and core strong. I also worked out with the weighted balls lifting them in many different positions preparing me for when I will carry the baby all around.

Our Family. The boys are so excited too!

I Love Her Sooooo Much!

She was three days old in this picture.

Savannah is now 3 weeks old and I look forward to being able to go back to working out in a couple of weeks. I want to get my abs back to being as strong as they were. I am also very excited to be able to start walking and standing with my half braces again. I don’t have much patience in waiting for my body to recuperate but I will have to be patient as it rebuilds it self up again. I know I will get there. Then I can try and push myself even further and see what happens.

My husband Scott and I adapted her crib so it opens up like french doors and I can place her in and get her out easily that way. I also had a friend of mine that had kids after she was injured give me her roll under changing table and it works great. Scott also built me a roll under table that I can attach her bouncy chair or baby swing to and so I can easily get her in and out. I know I will have to do some things different this time around, but I have no doubt that I will be able to do it all fine. :)

I feel so blessed to be able to be a new Mom again. We love her so much!!!

Still Going Strong!

2011-04-29T20:14:00.008-07:00

It’s been awhile since my last post. I wanted to share about my experience when I was asked to speak at the Stem Cell Convention in San Diego. I was one of the patients that got to share my story at the convention. It was a great experience. It was wonderful again to hear from the doctors all that is going on with their experiences with the treatment of patients with stem cells. It was very informative and I loved sharing my story with all the people there. They also posted my talk on their website so I am posting it also on here for you to see. If you want go to their website follow the link on my page and click on spinal cord injuries. Here is a picture of me before it started.

Here is my talk. I was nervous at first because I was expecting to be the 3rd patient to give their talk but they called me first so it threw me off guard at first as I was getting started. My talk went well though and I’m so glad I did it.

As I said before, I take it as my calling now to be a mentor to many other Spinal Cord Injury patients around the world. I used to talk to about 3 different people a week, but now after my talk in San Diego I get to talk with as many as 10 a day. They find me through my blog or from my You-tube video. I take a lot of time e-mailing and talking with all the people that contact me because I truly enjoy all the people I get to talk with. I love sharing our experiences and helping them out in any way I can. Most are interested in the stem cell information. I tell them about my experience with it and leave it to them to make their own choice about getting it or not. Many are so hopeful that they too will have as much success with it. Every patient and their injury is so different and the outcomes can be very different, but they have had many successes with SCI patients who did get the stem cells.

Things are still going good with my physical therapy. I’m still working out hard about 3 times a week. My core is still very strong and I do many exercises to keep my core, arms, and my hip

flexors strong. I also continue to stand and walk a lot in my half braces that go below my knees in therapy and sometimes at home. I continue to get stronger with how far I can walk with out having to rest. My theory is still that I don’t want to walk out in public on a day to day basis until I can at least walk as fast as I can wheel (Which is really fast.) I see no point in it yet when I’m running from place to place, which is constant, with being as active as I am & having two busy sons that I’m always running everywhere with. I do hope in my heart someday that I will be able to walk fast enough so that It will be worth while, while I’m out, but until then I’m fine because I am very confident with who I am in my chair and I will keep working on walking in therapy while I work out. But again, I am always thankful for the gains I have had since the stem cell. Having my core back makes everyday things easy again.

It’s nice that I can stand or walk around with the walker when I want to though. Scott & I had fun this weekend taking pictures standing and dancing some together. We were goofing around and it was fun. I posted some of the pictures below. I love seeing myself standing with my cute hubby. :)

2011-02-04T13:28:00.012-07:00

Hi Everyone,

It feels so good to be able to stand with very little pressure on the walker. I can do it without any hands also but I didn't want to yet without anyone near me.

Well, just three days after my last blog update I did something awesome! As I shared in my last entry I had begun to take just a few steps back and forth while practicing locking my own knees and shifting my weight from leg to leg. Well on Jan 21st after having my half braces a little over two weeks I told my therapist that I wanted to try walking. My very first try I walked about 30 feet. It was so exciting because I was actually taking normal steps where I would take a step then transfer my weight forward on that leg and put my weight on it while locking out my own knee. Then I would bend my other knee and step and do the same thing. It felt awesome! My therapist is helping me push the walker forward right now because he wants me to focus on all I need to do to walk and not have to worry about moving the walker yet. I will try it soon though. He is there in front of me and has his hands near by in case I was to buckle but he isn't helping me at all. This is much different than walking in those long bulky braces that I tried a few times last year. With those you feel excited because your up and moving on your own but it definitely wasn't the kind of walking that I wanted to do. With the half braces even though it's still slow going after my first few tries, I feel so excited to be walking bending my knees and then stepping and locking them out. The next time I tried 2 days later I doubled my first record of 30 feet and walked 60 feet. Now, I just hope that the stem cells continue to heal my injury on my spinal cord and I get faster and faster at walking. I will attach the video of my second try walking. I wanted to delete the sound but couldn't. Just ignore the sound of another patient and her therapist talking in the background. You can't hear me or Mark (My therapist).

The same day before I walked in the half braces for the first time, I more than doubled my sit up record too. It must have been a strong day. First I did at least 100 sit ups with the weighted ball (which actually makes coming up a little easier). Then I did 83 sit ups in a row on my own with out anything in my hands. After the 83, I did a few more to reach 100 with out the ball but I got the 83 in a row without stopping or my muscles fatiguing. I was very proud. I have come so far because before the stem cell I could only lean back on the mat a few inches before falling back and having to catch my self with my arms.

Scott and I also were excited to stand up together to take this photo. If felt great because we haven't been able to do that in over 3 1/2 years. I love standing like this with him again!

Exciting Progress

2011-01-18T13:06:00.018-07:00

Now I'm standing with my half braces that don't block my knees.

Hi everyone,

Sorry it's been awhile since my last post. I've just been very busy with working out, volunteering at the schools and enjoying life with my family. :)

I finally got my half braces below my knees a couple of weeks ago. I can stand in them for as long as I want usually an hour at a time without anyone blocking my knees or touching me at all. At times I put very light touch on the walker or parallel bars, but I can also do it with no hands touching the walker at all. When I do this my therapist is still close by just in case my knees buckle. This doesn't happen often but locking out my own knees it is a new sensation for me to think about doing on my own while I'm standing.

The other day in therapy I had both hands up not touching and I got to play catch with a tennis ball against a little trampoline that was in the vertical position against the wall.My therapist was behind me just in case. Since both of my hands were up not touching, he was there to provide extra stability if needed. I played softball all through school so this was fun for me. Those of you that know me well know that I'm very competitive so this was a fun new challenge for me . I would work on throwing it hard against the trampoline then catch it with the opposite hand then switch to the same hand in all sorts of different angles to challenge myself. Sometimes I would forget that I needed to balance and just go for it when it was really low or high not even thinking. I of course never wanted it to drop. This was fun and I pushed myself hard with out even thinking about it.

In my half braces I can also take a few steps forward and backwards locking my own knees. Remember long ago I could walk pretty far around the gym in my long braces that locked my knees. But they were so bulky and it was still slow going and tiring. Well, this is exciting in my new super light half braces because I am learning how to lock my own knees as I step. It's a conscious effort to do so right now but we're hoping the more I do it and the more the stem cells continue to heal my injured spinal cord, the easier it will be. My knees aren't completely locking on their own all the time yet. The half braces lock out my ankle and this in turn helps my knees to lock a little in some positions.

I am still good at sit ups using the 4 inch wedge behind me. I can do up to 40 in a row all on my own with out the use of a weighted ball. Then I try each time to do as many like that until my abs are fatigued. I can do as many as I want with the weighted 5 pound or 3 pound ball. I usually do 100 of those before I try to do it with nothing in my hands which is much harder. I will continue to try and beat my record of 40 in a row.

In the next few months I'm going to San Diego to speak at a presentation about adult stem cell. Some of the Dr.s from Panama will be there and some of the other patients that had success with stem cell for many different reasons. I will write more about the details of it as it gets closer and we have the set date.

Well, that is it for now. I'll write more as things change. Please always keep me in your thoughts and prayers.

Take Care,

Trish

Already Some Improvement

2010-10-19T12:43:00.012-07:00

We got home on Saturday the 2nd around 2:30 pm. We were so excited to see the boys! I missed them so much, but enjoyed talking to them on Skype each morning while I was gone. They are on October break now for two weeks. I’m looking forward to hanging out with them. When I was swimming with them the day after I got back I was sitting in the pool on a step and I was able to kick my right leg out about 8 inches without recruiting any other muscles for help. This was very encouraging since before I could only kick it out an inch or so with out using other muscles to help do this. Stay tuned for more updates as I progress. Again, remember that it can take up to 6 or 7 months to see all the effects of the stem cells and my hard work.
My first day back at therapy I was able to do sit ups with only about a 4 inch wedge behind me, all on my own. Before Panama, I needed that wedge plus a pillow and my therapist had to hold my fingers as I was coming up to help me some. I’m so excited to do them on my own now. I want to work on not even having the 4 inch wedge behind me at all. Then it will be a normal sit up all the way.

Now during the neuro which is when they shock my muscles to help my legs move and contract well, my legs kick out straight at only a level 6. Before I got more stem cells, they needed a level 10 to do this. I hope these are all signs of even more good to come. It’s exciting each day to see what will happen next. I feel very strong and it feels good. Again, I am so thankful for any return and I believe more will come!

On October 7th I went to the Grand Opening of the Celebration Stem Cell Center that just opened in Gilbert. It’s located by Mercy Gilbert Medical Center off the 202. It was a great event. I was excited to see Sherry Lund there. She is the one who originally introduced me to the idea of stem cells and the Stem Cell Institute. She is such a wonderful lady who has always believed that each life is precious. This is the facilities mission statement.

Mission Statement
It is to provide the highest quality of viable stem cells for transplant and regenerative medicine and to increase awareness of the healing effects of stem cells. There is a medical necessity to establish a diverse and global inventory of cord blood stem cells to offer hope to patients who suffer from a life threatening disease or injury. Through a comprehensive public awareness campaign, we will reveal the facts about stem cell therapy.

If you want to learn more you can contact them at http://www.celebrationstemcellcentre.com/

As she was giving the presentation with her family and the Mayor of Gilbert was talking too, they asked me to speak. I wasn't expecting this but I was happy to share my story and people were very touched. I met many wonderful people and doctors. How exciting that a umbilical cord blood bank and stem cell processing center is right here in Gilbert, Arizona. It’s still too bad that they can’t use these stem cells here in the US yet for spinal cord injury patients. But, it is a huge step to help the US get further along in this amazing medical treatment.

I am so grateful that Cell Medicine in Panama is there for us now. They were wonderful, caring and honest people. They can’t promise that it will work for everyone, but through their patients they are seeing many amazing results. Please keep me in your prayers as I continue on my journey.

Our Last Day in Panama

2010-10-19T12:28:00.003-07:00

Well Friday October 1st was our last day here in Panama. I went to physical therapy and worked out then we said good bye to the new friends we met. We hope to keep in contact with them to share our good results along the way.

My last injection went well. I said goodbye to Dr. Herrero my anesthesiologist. She was great! Each time that I got an injection into my spinal fluid, she would always say. “Good Job Trish, One less” Now I’m all done for this treatment. Yeah!

I am excited to get home and start working out again. I am very optimistic and hopeful to see what will return this time. I’m also very excited for the future. With how things are going in the medical world things look very bright for people with spinal cord injuries.

2010-10-01T18:34:00.006-07:00

Sorry it has been a few days since the last post, but there hasn’t been much new to report. Tuesday night we went out to dinner with Dr. Ugalde and Natalia, who also works at the lab. We went to a great restaurant that was chosen by Natalia. It was called Jaleo. It had a nice atmosphere, and the food was great.

Wednesday was a therapy and injection day. Between therapy and the injection we met up with Shaun Doss and his Dad Robert. Trish knows Shaun from back home at SOS therapy. He’s a 7 year old with a spinal cord injury. We were excited to meet up with them and take a stroll down the boardwalk. However, it was really hot out and were all happy to finally get into the mall and grab a bite to eat. Wednesday was Trish’s first injection of her own bone marrow stem cells. Everything went smoothly with the injection and the rest of the evening was spent relaxing.

Thursday was therapy and then an IV. At therapy we met another spinal cord injury patient, Bruce, from Iowa. After meeting at therapy we made plans to go out for dinner that night with him and his friend Melissa.

After Trish’s IV we got to go to the lab for a tour. This was really interesting. The lab is located next to the canal on the old US military base. There are a lot of businesses located in this area and several US Universities that have small campuses here. We thought that was interesting. The lab Director, who we met last week, gave a nice presentation of their processes and procedures on how they prepare the cells. It’s a huge process. We loved learning more about it. We also met Pablo, who is the CEO of the clinic. He too was very personable and took time with us to answer any questions we had. While we were there we also saw Natalia again and she was busy working on the cells. We missed Dr. Ugalde as he left the day prior to fly to Minnesota to run a marathon – Good luck Federico! It’s clear from talking to everyone at the lab
(and the clinic in general), they are all very excited about the work they are doing and love what they do. They are so hopeful of even more possibilities for the future. We had hoped to see
Dr. Riordan again, but he was out of the country and was returning later tonight.

After the lab tour we went out to dinner with Bruce and Melissa to another great restaurant it was called Don Patacon. We tried ceviche, an appetizer, which is a dish they are known for here. It’s raw fish marinated in citrus juices (lime and lemon) and then it also had mangos, coconut milk, and other spices. It was great! For dinner we both ordered another fish dish, red snapper this time, which was delicious. We have really loved the food down here. It’s really good and affordable. It was great to have dinner with Bruce and Melissa. They were both really nice and we hope to keep in touch with them after we leave here.

Here are some real cool pictures of mesenchmal stem cells that they shared with us at the lab. Dye has been added to enhance the pictures.

This picture is of the mesenchymal stem cells in their natural form. As you can see they are relatively flat.

As the cells get ready to split they start to get into a ball shape.

Here is a really cool picture of a cell splitting!

Here are a few pictures of some of the rooms in the lab.

Here is Trish and Natalia. We met Natalia earlier in the week and were very impressed with her knowledge and passion for the work they are doing in the lab!

We are not sure why, but there have been fireworks right outside the condo over the bay twice since we have been here, the last one was Thursday night. Check out the pictures!

Friday is our last day in Panama! Trish has therapy and her last injection (Bone marrow again). We will be busy packing and getting ready to leave in the morning. Our flight is at 7:00 in the morning which means we need to leave our condo at 4:30, which means we need to get up around 2:30, which is 12:30 am back home! Saturday is going to be another long travel day, but boy are we excited to get home!!! It’s been nice talking with the boys each morning on Skype but we miss them like crazy!

Catching Up on the Past Few Days

2010-09-28T14:16:00.006-07:00

Sunday was pretty low key, we got caught up on laundry, took a long stroll along the boardwalk and then walked across the street for a movie. The movie theater is interesting. They are very modern and they have “regular” movies and “VIP” movies. The VIP movies include leather lounge chairs and there is a waiter or waitress that will take food orders and deliver it to you during the movie! We just went to a regular movie, but might try to catch a VIP movie before we leave. The VIP movies cost about the same as normal movies back home and the regular movies are half price. All in all Sunday was a very relaxing day.

Monday was another day of physical therapy, followed by a trip to the mall and then Trish’s 3rd injection. This time we went to the big mall. It's huge with very high end stores. So, no purchases for us other than a cup of coffee. :)

The injection on Monday contained fresh, non-expanded cells. Typically, the clinic receives the cells and then splits them to produce more cells and then freezes them until they are injected. The cells Trish got Monday have never been spilt, so they were brand new cells. These cells have been shown to work better, but can’t be used more often because of the cost and the overall availability of umbilical cord blood stem cells. The injection went well again and then Trish was down resting for the night, letting the stem cells do there thing! And, no headache!

Here we are working on balance in Physical Therapy. Ivan puts me to work helping out, which I love!

Here is Trish and Ivan her Physical Therapist posing for the camera!

This is a picture of the stem cells being injected in Trish's spinal fluid.

Here is (from left to right) the nurse (didn't catch his name), Dr. Herrero (the anesthesiologist), and Dr. Hernandez (the general Dr.)

Here Trish is with 2 of the patient coordinators, Samantha and Viviane. They are so sweet and Trish enjoys talking with them when she goes in for her treatments. Trish doesn't have a picture with Melisa yet, but will be sure to get one before we leave. It's nice because the clinic gave us a cell phone to make local calls while were here. It's nice because if we ever need anything day or night, they are always there to help.

Tuesday was physical therapy and then an IV. The IV was Trish’s first containing her own cells from her bone marrow. All in all from her bone marrow, she will get 2 bone marrow IV’s and 2 bone marrow injections. All of these will come over the next four days.

Things are going well, but we are getting home sick and ready to come home. We miss our boys, our pets, our family and friends very much! Thanks so much for your posts. It's great to hear from you.

We Love Monkeys!!!

2010-09-25T15:21:00.014-07:00

Yesterday afternoon while I had to lay flat after my injection, Scott walked to a different grocery store that was about a mile away. It was open and he got stuff for us to make more of our meals at the condo. He came back with these flowers to surprise me. What a great guy he is!

Well, this morning we headed out to the Panama Canal and Monkey Island. William had his driver Victor drive us there. It's only a half an hour away. On the way there we saw an ant eater on the side of the road. Victor knows the local stuff so he got us a local boat tour guide that took us all around Lake Gatun and through parts of the canal. The canal actually runs through the lake. The boat was a small boat that could hold about 8 people. Our boat had only us 3 and the guide. It was fun going fast across the water passing some huge freighters as we went.

The boat stopped in front of a little island which we could quickly see was “Monkey Island”. The White Face Monkeys came running out to the end of the limbs on the trees to greet us. You can tell that they are used to boats coming up to them with food. They're not shy at all. Quickly about 6 monkeys jumped on our boat. One climbed right on Scott’s lap as we fed them pieces of bananas that Victor brought along. They were so cute! They kept grabbing bananas out of our hands and stuffing their faces. They would let you touch them and they would wrap their soft little hands around your fingers. It was so cool! Then they would jump back to the trees in the jungle. Then we would go a little further and more would jump on our boat. You have to watch your stuff or they will steal it and jump away. One of them took a little bag that Victor had. Their quick. What an amazing opportunity to be this close with wild monkeys. I wish so bad that Hunter and Parker could have been here to do this too.

Next we drove further on the lake and saw some other animals. We saw a big turtle, an alligator, an iguana, and some bigger black monkeys.

Here is the big Iguana in the tree.

Look close for two black monkeys.

Here they are closer.

Next we got back in the car and headed to Miraflores Locks. We went into the museum and watched a video explaining the history and how they built the Panama Canal. In the early 1900’s many different cultures came together to build the canal that would go through a strip of land 48 miles wide and connect the Pacific and the Atlantic Oceans. What a feat! The locks are necessary to bring the boat from sea level up to the level of the canal and lake. They do this by filling the locks with water, or letting water out. This brings the ships up or down each section. We were able to watch a big freighter go through the locks, which was very interesting to see. There are actually 3 sets of locks along the canal and we were at the one that is the entrance/exit with the Pacific Ocean. There are currently 2 lanes at the locks and boats can go through both ways. There is currently a huge expansion going on in which they are planning on building another set of locks, as well as widening and deepening the existing channel. They anticipate that this will be done in 2014. It was interesting.

Now we are back in our condo for a relaxing evening. Make sure that you click on the post before this. "A Night Out" because we posted that one and this one on the same day. Talk to you soon.

A Night Out

2010-09-25T14:28:00.002-07:00

Thursday night out with Dr. Ugalde was great! He is such a caring and fun guy! We went to a nice restaurant called The Market. We were also joined by one of Dr. Ugalde’s colleagues from the lab. The conversation was great. It was very interesting to talk to them about the all they are doing with the stem cells. They’re so intelligent and excited about all their work. We get to go on a tour of the lab next week. It will be very interesting.

After dinner they took us on a tour of Casco Viejo. This is an older part of the city that is being renovated. There are lots of little clubs with live music. It’s also full of history. Mary Laura (this is how you would say her name in English), was extremely knowledgeable about the history of Panama. She took lots of time with us showing us many different parts of Panama’s history. She was excited when talking about how you can discover the magic in a culture by examining their history. It was interesting. Casco Viejo was actually the 2nd main city that was built. It’s over 100 years old. The first city they built was burned down by pirates and this one was built among the rocks so the pirate ships couldn’t get too close to attack.

Friday was full with therapy in the morning and my second injection in the afternoon. The injection went well. Again, the staff at the Stem Cell Institute is awesome. After my injection I laid flat in bed for the rest of the night to allow the stem cells to start to travel up to my injury spot as well as to try and avoid a spinal headache. We watched movies and hung out and I only had a slight headache when I woke up in the morning.

Now for the fun! Saturday we are planning on going out to see the Panama Canal. We will be going to see the locks and hopefully catch a ship going through. We also plan on taking a boat tour on the canal to a place called Monkey Island.

Another Day in Panama City

2010-09-23T16:34:00.007-07:00

As expected today was a relatively easy day. Trish had physical therapy in the morning where she spent a lot of time standing and showing the therapist here how she stands in her walker without using her hands once she's up with her knees blocked. He was very impressed and said in his year and a half working with spinal cord injuries here in Panama he has never seen someone injured at her level do something like that! She also worked hard with some new exercises. She had fun and always works so hard.

After therapy we headed back to the condo for a bit and were able to see a couple of ships headed to the canal entrance.

Later we met up with a couple of friends at one of the malls here is town. The mall is very modern and we plan to go back and walk around when we have some more free time.

This is William. He's such a great guy and has been very accomodating to us and very helpful with anything we need. He arranged our condo and will help us plan our tourist excursions!

These are our friends Holly and Raj. Holly is down here for treatments for her MS, and we were also in Costa Rica together last year. It's such a coincidence that we were here at the same time again.

The mall is right across the street from the Stem Cell Institute so we crossed the street for Trish’s IV, which went really well.

The Stem Cell Institue is located on the 1st floor of this building.

This is Dr. Hernandez injecting the stem cells through the IV. Here he is telling Trish exactly what kind of cells, what their purpose is, and how many are being injected.

After the IV we headed home and decided to make a trip across the street to the grocery store (which is in bottom floor of the mall). Now when I say crossing the street, I don’t mean finding a cross walk and waiting for he light to turn. This means risking life and limb to get to the other side. The traffic here is crazy, there doesn’t appear to be any rules. Anyway, we made it across and through the mall only to find out that the grocery store was closed. We asked a worker in the mall when they open and his response was that he didn’t know but that they were closed yesterday too. He wasn’t sure when they would open again! I guess we’ll try again tomorrow!

We are headed out to dinner tonight with Dr. Ugalde, we are really excited to go out with him! He told Trish earlier that they got lots of great stem cells out of her bone marrow and they look great!

Bone Marrow Day

2010-09-22T20:32:00.005-07:00

Here's Trish in her cute get up, ready for her bone marrow aspiration!

Trish woke up with a small headache that seemed to last throughout the day. Hopefully her body will get use to the spinal injections and she won’t get any more. The bone marrow aspiration went well. The Doctor who performed the procedure was very nice. After the procedure we headed to the condo and rested for the afternoon. We added a couple more shots of the view from our place. It’s relaxing to look out over the water.

Here is the start of the boardwalk that runs along the bay.

We decided to head out just before the sun went down and took a walk along the long boardwalk that runs in front of the condo along the ocean. It was really nice and the views of the city were amazing. It was also cool to see the boats lined up waiting to pass through the Panama Canal.

It's a little hard to see, but if you look close you can see the ships lined up in the distance.

After our walk we headed across the street to the Hard Rock Cafe. We had a nice dinner and saw a popular singer from Columbia while we were there. Of course neither of us had ever heard of him, but it was fun to see the restaurant abuzz with excitement.

Tomorrow looks to be a fairly easy day with physical therapy in the morning and an IV in the afternoon. We hope to get the chance to go out with Dr. Ugalde to dinner tomorrow night. He is the Dr. that Trish mostly communicated with before we came to Panama. He is very nice and came by to see Trish at her appointment at the clinic yesterday. He mainly works in the lab and research part of the clinic. He’s in charge of the spinal cord injury patients. We are excited to get the chance to get to talk with him more.

Thanks for all the well wishes!

We made it to Panama City!

2010-09-21T19:45:00.004-07:00

The trip was relatively uneventful, but was a long travel day. We left at 7:00 Sunday morning and didn’t land in Panama until about 9:00 at night. By the time we got through customs got our bags and got to the condo it was pretty late. The condo is fine. The view is awesome. From one whole side ,we look out over the ocean and can also see the city. We picked the condo because it was actually cheaper than a hotel and it has a kitchen so we can eat at “home” some of the time. The only issue is that things in Panama aren’t very accessible. Some of the doorways are too narrow for a wheelchair to fit through. But as always, we dealt with it and now have everything figured out!

Here we are waiting in our "VIP" room at the airport. They actually got all of our bags for us and got us through customs very quickly.

This is the view from the windows of our condo!

We didn’t get to bed until about midnight the first night and needed to get up at 6:00 for the clinic to come take blood. They took a total of 12 viles! They use the serum from the blood to mix with the stem cells before they inject them. They actually came to our condo to draw the blood, which was really nice.

Later in the day Trish had her initial evaluation down at the clinic. During her evaluation, they decided to take an x-ray of her back so they could see the space between her vertebrae at the injection site. We got quite a surprise when the x-ray came back and showed that Trish had a broken tail bone! They said it does not look like a fresh break, but it was definitely broken. This is one of our greatest fears…having Trish get hurt and not even know it! They said it was an older injury, but definitely since her accident and that there is really nothing they can do for it now. Other than that, the evaluation went well and we actually ran into a friend we had met in Costa Rica last year! We were so excited. All of the staff and Doctors at the stem cell clinic were extremely nice. It's only about 5 minutes from the condo so travel time is great. Although, depending on the time of day the traffic in Panama can be crazy! Panama City is the biggest city either of us has ever been to. It’s hard to explain, but it’s packed with sky scrapers everywhere. Plus, the building just keeps on going. It really is an amazing site! We had no idea the city was so big.

Monday was also my birthday so Trish got a great recommendation on a local restaurant from the girls at the clinic. We went to a place called Jymy’s. The food was great! At the recommendation of the locals, I tried the grilled octopus! It was actually really good. Trish had spaghetti with alfredo sauce and octopus as well, and is was delicious! You could definitely say we are experiencing the culture of Panama!

Tuesday was busy. The day started with Trish’s first physical therapy appointment. She met her physical therapist, Ivan, and worked out hard for an hour. Unfortunately they are only allotted 1 hour appointments. The set up is more like a gym with a physical trainer. Trish is looking forward to sharing the therapy techniques she learned in Costa Rica and with her therapists at home with the therapists here. This way as more spinal cord injury patients come they will have a broader spectrum of exercises to do to help as the stem cells start to rebuild the connections and as the signals start getting through.

After therapy we checked out the mall across the street from our condo and had lunch at good old Micky D’s. The mall was very nice and big, 4 stories high! Next we headed off to Trish’s first injection. Again, the staff at the clinic are extremely nice and helpful. The Anesthesiologist,

Dr. Herrero, is amazing. She is so caring and knowledgeable. We truly feel like we are in good hands with her. She is passionate about her work and you can tell that she really cares about Trish. The injection went flawlessly. In fact Trish actually felt the needle go into her back! This is something that never happened in Costa Rica and is a great sign. We were all so excited, even the Doctor!

Now Trish is down for the night and so far is headache free! It is always a possibility that she will get a spinal headache after one of these procedures and Trish will do everything in her power to avoid one!

Tomorrow is a big day. Trish will be getting the bone marrow aspiration procedure. This procedure was a bit nerve wracking for us in Costa Rica last year as we had to check into the hospital and we were not dealing with the staff from Cell Medicine. This time, Dr. Herrero will be Trish’s Anesthesiologist for the procedure so we feel very comfortable going into tomorrow's procedure.

That’s all for now!

My Trip is Postponed

2010-09-09T13:14:00.003-07:00

Hi there,
I wanted to let everyone know that our trip has been postponed for two weeks. When I was in Costa Rica a year ago, I had some of my bone marrow taken out. They used part of it for my treatment, then they stored the other part of it for later in case I ever needed it. When the doctors thawed my bone marrow for my upcoming visit, they noticed that some of the cells were no longer good. They let me know right away and now when I do go to Panama, I will have to get my bone marrow extracted again. This way when they take my own stem cells out of my bone marrow, they will all be fresh and healthy. They were not expecting me to have to do this again and there was a problem finding a doctor to do the procedure on such short notice. This is why I had to postpone our trip the two weeks. I am now scheduled for September 19-
October 2nd. We changed our flights and hotel and are now all set. We will update my blog when we are down there. I am excited and hopeful that this will bring even more return to my body with more movement and sensation. Wish me luck and keep me in your prayers. I'll update you soon.

More Stem Cells

2010-08-24T14:46:00.003-07:00

Things are still going good and I'm continuing to work hard with my physical therapy. I just wanted to let everyone know that I have decided to go back to get more stem cells. A few of the spinal cord injury people I made aware about the stem cell treatments in Costa Rica have gone down there but are now wanting to go back. So I decided I should call the Dr.’s down there and see what they thought. The Dr.’s told me that many of their Spinal cord injury patients that have gone back for a “booster” as they call it are having good results and have been gaining even more. There are no guarantees but they are very hopeful for me because I had such good success the first time. So after more research we decided to go again. This time I will only be going for two weeks instead of the four weeks I did last time.
We will be gone in early September. Their facilities used to be in both Costa Rica and Panama. They decided to consolidate both facilities to the one in Panama. So that is where I am going this time. We will try to keep up on my blog while we are down there again. I get to work out with their physical therapists again 4-5 days a week. I will also be getting 5 injections and 3 IV’s. This is half of what I got last time but they are hoping I will see good results from it because others have. So keep us in your prayers as we go on this next adventure. It’s great to have “Hope” for continued healing.

Continuing Progress

2010-07-08T08:10:00.008-07:00

Hi again,
Things are still going well. I still continue to work out 3 times a week around 3 hours each time. I’m still improving and my muscles are still getting stronger. I can now stand in the walker without using my hands and keeping my body in the middle of the walker without touching the sides with my hips at all for 40 minutes each time consistently. I keep my hips locked and in position by myself. My therapist is there to still block my knees. They still are not locking on their own. I can now keep my balance with no hands and lift weights over my head. I also can keep my balance when they push my hips from side to side. Everyone is excited about it. I used to have to focus a lot while doing this. I now talk as I do this with my therapist and I can still do well without having to focus the whole time. I also work a lot on keeping my core and upper body strong. It’s great as I said before having my core back. I never realized how much I used it until my accident. But now that it’s back, I’m very happy.

I haven’t been doing water therapy these past 3 months because I have been dealing with reoccurring UTI’s and I didn’t want to be in the water in case I was getting bacteria from it. I am now clear of the UTI’s as of last week and I went back in the water for therapy today. It is great to work on making the weaker muscles stronger in there. I’m interested in trying to continue to lock my knees on my own underwater. I hope that they continue to connect more.
I was mapped out again for sensation on Tuesday. I continue to gain more sensation. I can now feel even more soft touch, sharp touch and ice than before. I also continue to feel the pressure touch in many places as I did before. Another thing that is neat about it when they bend or move any part of my body I can tell. Before the stem cell I couldn’t feel any of it.
It has been a nice summer so far it’s going so fast. We have been having lots of fun as a family.

“Look No Hands”

2010-04-24T20:42:00.004-07:00

Hi again,
Days after I posted my last blog something exciting happened. I was able to stand up in my walker, get my hips into position and lock them on my own, and then let go of the walker with my hands! I still have to have my knees be blocked by a piece of Styrofoam because they aren’t blocking themselves yet, but being able to do this is awesome!
When I did this, I was so excited that I actually got happy tears in my eyes. The reason it’s so exciting is before I went to Costa Rica for the Stem Cell I never had the opportunity to even try standing in a walker. The therapists at Barrow's didn’t think it would even be possible. Then once I started working on standing while in Costa Rica, it was so hard! I couldn’t put much weight at all on my legs therefore my arms had to compensate for all that weight. I had to put so much pressure on my arms. It also took two therapists to get me stable in the walker. One had to stand behind me to hold my hips in place and the other had to block my knees. Even with their help, holding me up, my arms got so tired because I had to put so much pressure on them to hold myself up. I could only stay up with all that help for about a minute at the most and it took all my strength to last that long.
Then as time went on, I continued to work hard here at SOS therapy. I continually improved. Here are the steps I went through with standing, as I improved in the last 4 months.

1) First, I couldn’t tuck my pelvis under me to stand in the correct position. I needed help with this and my arms still took most of the pressure of my body weight while holding on to the walker.
2) Next, I grew by being able to tuck my pelvis under in the right position without help. Next, I could hold my hips in place for a long time by myself as long as I was holding on to the walker.
3) Later, I was able to let go of the walker with my hands if my therapist helped to hold my hips locked in place. He only had to put a little pressure on my hips. I could stand like this for quite a while.
4) Then as time went on, my therapist would help me get my hips into position then let go and I could let go of my hands from the walker. I could only do it without my therapist touching me or me touching the walker for 30-45 second intervals.
5) Now, this Wednesday the 21st, after working on standing for a half hour or so, I got up, got my own hips into position and locked by myself and let go of the walker with my hands. I was able to stand up with no one touching me and without touching the walker for several 3 minute or so bursts followed by my record time so far of 5 minutes. Yeah! I could of gone even longer but I stopped at 5 minutes, very proud of my accomplishment. I can’t wait to go longer next time. Scott was able to watch me do this later in the week and he too is very proud and amazed by how much I am improving and how far I have come. The therapists are also amazed by my progress and impressed by how quickly I’m doing it. It’s exciting!

When I did water therapy last week, my therapist Jodi was very excited because she said when I was walking with her in the pool that my knees were starting to lock themselves as I walked under water. She puts pressure on them as I walk and my right leg hardly needed any pressure put against it and it was stepping really good. My left leg did doing pretty good and I hope it catches up to my right leg soon. Some days my right is better and other days my left is better when walking in the water.
My attitude continues to be positive. I am so grateful for all that has come back so far and I feel very blessed. I hope for more improvement and I will continue to work hard. I’m so excited about having had the opportunity to get the stem cell. I feel so happy with my life. Things are good!

More Progress!!

2010-03-28T10:55:00.007-07:00

Hi everyone. I have wanted to update my blog for awhile so here I go. I now only go to SOS Physical Therapy for both water therapy and “land” therapy as I call it. I work out there 3 times a week between 3-4 hours each visit. It’s a lot of work but I love it.

I also work out at home with my sister-in-law once a week. We have fun working out and catching up on what has been going on in each other’s lives. She helps me use my standing frame to do kind of like backwards sit ups. This works out my back really good. We also lift weight and do lots of sit ups.

Things have continued to improve these last 3 months. I can now do many things that I do in everyday life much easier now that I have more strength and balance. My abs, sides, and back are very strong now. I work out on the mat for about 2 hours. Here are some of the things I do there. I work out on the total gym keeping my upper body and core muscles very strong. Also when laying on the total gym, I can push myself up using my legs. Their still not very strong because all of my leg muscles aren’t connecting yet but I can still do it a little and this is exciting to me. Just imagine it like a squat with me laying down.

Then I work hard on my abs, and back on the mat. One of the ways I do this is I get on all 4’s like crawling and they push me with consistent pressure and try to knock me off balance. I can hold strong in the 8 different directions they push me in. This is a big improvement because before the stem cells I would fall if the wind blew. :)
Next, I get in a plank position and hold it like 6 inches off the matt without letting myself go down. It’s exciting to have abs that are very strong again. I also work on standing without the braces in the walker. I still can’t keep my knees locked without something blocking them. They use a Styrofoam thing to bock my knees and I can stand tall. I improved a lot with this in the last month. I used to only be able to stand up in the walker in the correct position for about a minute without getting tired. I had to use my arms on the walker and I was struggling with using my arms too much. I now can do it at least 4-5 minutes and with no hands once I’m up. My therapist does still help me get my hips in the right spot but each week I am getting closer to doing it myself. It’s a big deal. I am finally able to put my weight on my legs and line up just right. It feels great! It is also much easier now to hold my hips in just the right spot. I can now rotate my pelvis forward into the correct spot. This was impossible for me to do before and now it comes natural. I can also tell when I am not standing evenly or am off a bit and I can correct it on my own.

In the pool I also like to work on getting my abs, back, sides, butt, and hip flexors all stronger. I can walk in the pool if I’m holding on to the therapists with my hands. I also work a lot on standing from a sitting position in there. I can use a noodle and pedal my legs like I’m riding a bike. It’s cool. This is working my hip flexors a lot. Now with my new strength I can swim laps doing the breast stroke or the back stroke. Of course I don’t use my legs while doing it but I’m still good at it and it’s fun! I also continue to work on getting my legs to move more on their own. They still only move a little. I can only hope for more connections with them, but as for now I’m very happy with what is now working well so far.

I‘ve been checked a few more times with a full body scan as to see if my sensation continues to improve. It does. I can feel more and more each time with soft touch, pressure touch and sharp touch. I also continue to feel ice more. I can feel all of the sensations on my ankles and feet and certain areas on my legs and bootie. I do feel it now all the way to my waist on my front and back too. The sensation is still not the same as where I feel normal but I can definitely feel.

Something that I have been doing that I feel so happy about is, I have also been in contact with many other spinal cord injury patients. I love talking with them and helping them in any way that I can. I think that they mostly find me through this blog. I am just so happy to help lift their spirits and to give them hope. I don’t care if they decide to get stem cells or not but it’s my mission to at least tell anyone that I know about my experience and then it’s up to them to choose if it’s for them or not. I wish so much that I was told of this opportunity right after my accident. The Dr.’s here never told me this was even an option. Even though it’s not approved here yet, I wish that I would have been made aware of it. But now I can help let people know and we all can continue to hope for the future. :)

The one area that is still very frustrating to me is that I still continue to get reoccurring UTI’s. These are frustrating to deal with and the Dr.’s still haven’t figured out how to stop them from happening.

Something was said to me in a card I received recently that struck me as funny, they said ” It must seem like forever since you have been able to do the things you want to do” I sat and thought for a second bummed out that some people still think of me that way, like I can’t do things as before. The thing is, I can’t think of anything that I don’t do that I would like to. Of course I would like to walk or run but I’m pretty fast in my chair. :) I still have fun shooting hoops with the boys or playing baseball or catch with the football with them. My husband always says jokingly to me , “Gee, I wish I had a stay at home wife that actually stayed home sometimes” I’m on the go as much as any other mom would be working out, doing errands, cooking meals, doing laundry, being a taxi for the kids, visiting friends, & of course volunteering. I am also very busy with the boys and their sports. They’re both on Club baseball teams and are very busy with school.

Our family is going snow skiing again this year over Spring Break. I loved skiing before I got hurt. I tried adaptive skiing last year for the first time. I did it twice and was doing blues from the top by the second day. It was so much fun. I just love being out there skiing right with my family. I will post pictures when we get back. I’m excited because I bet it will be much easier this year now that I have my core working good.

Well, we went skiing and it was great. Scott and Parker snowboarded and Hunter ad I skied. It was easier now that I have my core working. It’s a lot of fun and great to be out there enjoying the day with my family.

Take care everyone and I will update again in the future.

Finally a new update! :)

2009-12-30T15:22:00.011-07:00

I'm now starting my 4th month with the stem cells. They said by the end of the 6th month I should know the effects of what the stem cells will do. I can't believe that I've been back three months now.
Great things have been happening in therapy. For the past 2 months I've been going to the Neuro Institute for Physical Therapy twice a week. I've also been going to SOS Physical Therapy for water therapy twice a week. I work out at each place for 3 hours at a time. I made the decision to quit volunteering in the classrooms as often for awhile because working out (therapy) is now my job. So now I'm very busy working out 4 days a week. I still volunteer in my son Hunter's classroom. I wouldn't give that up. They grow up so fast I want to be there. I also still help at Brisas for half a day on Tuesdays.

So now for the exciting news......... As I said in the last post before I got the stem cells, I could only move or feel from my bra strap area up. I now have my abs, back, obliques, hip flexors, and my glutes all working. It's so great to have my core working again. I'm working on getting them stronger every day. It already makes a difference in my everyday life.

Next, I'll start with what's been going on in water therapy. First of all I want to explain that water therapy is really good for me because my body is much lighter underwater. This makes it much easier for my muscles to try and move if they can. When I first went there, they did a very detailed whole body map to see where I could feel and what I could move at the time. They have done this big evaluation twice now since I started and it changes for the better each time! At this point I can feel my whole core with pressure touch. That's my back, abs , bootie, sides, and hips. I can also feel down the top of my right quad. Then when they put ice on my feet or legs, I can feel that too. I have to lay down and keep my eyes closed the whole time while they do the tests. I just hope it keeps continuing down further and further. When I stop and think about it it's so amazing that I now have at least a foot and 1/2 more of my body that's working!

This past Monday in the pool I was able to kick back my leg and bend my knee. I did this with both legs. Then I was also able to lift my leg up (Like marching) about 6 inches on both legs. Just a month before I couldn't do this. They don't allow me to use any of my upper body muscles when I try to move. They just want to see what's connecting.

In the land therapy, I am working on making my newly returned muscles and my muscles that I already had working stronger. I love working out now. When I have a weekend and a few days off I get excited to go back and work out more. Now it's all about making the muscles that are working stronger. So I work a lot on my core. I am also continuing in both places to try and connect more muscles by trying to move my legs over and over. We are just hoping for the nerves to be able to send the signals from my brain to my legs through my injured spot on my spinal cord. It's great that some signals are getting through.
I can crawl with lifting my knees off the ground too. I was excited. I can also be on my knees with my back up tall next to a mat. Here is a picture of me doing this at home.

I'm also able to sit up much taller now and balance. People have told me I look like I lost weight, but really I haven't it's just that my stomach muscles are now working so they hold in my guts much better. I feel so excited about that!

I can now walk with a walker and leg braces. It's still very hard and tiring, and I'm not fast at all yet, but at least I can do it. I am working on putting more and more pressure on my legs as I take steps or stand. At this point on land I'm using mostly my abs and hip flexors to walk. They ordered me my own custom leg braces so they will fit me perfectly. Here is a funny picture of my leg casts that they used to make my braces. I get the braces soon.

So I will continue to try and walk in hopes that someday I will do it faster and not need the braces or walker. Until then I will get around in my wheelchair since it's much faster. Those of you who know me well know I'm always on the go and walking slow wouldn't do. But just being able to if I choose to would be great! I will continue to work hard at it in therapy.

I will add some more pictures soon. I need to bring my camera to therapy next time. I promise I will add another blog update sooner this time. Please keep me in your prayers as I continue on my journey.

We are Home & Trish continues working hard

2009-10-29T11:54:00.005-07:00

We are so sorry it took so long to post a new entry. We have been so busy with life since we've been back. Well, we made it back home and are getting back in the swing of “real” life! It has been quite an adjustment after a month in Costa Rica!

First of all Scott and I would like to thank everyone who has been following the blog. Your support, well wishes, and prayers have been so greatly appreciated. We couldn't have taken this great journey without all the love and support of our friends and family! But... Don't stop yet. We need all of the prayers to continue while I work out in therapy and out of therapy for the next 5 months while waiting for the results of the stem cells.

I am working really hard. I have continued therapies that include physical therapy at the Neuro Institute, a therapy and workout program at home, as well as workouts when possible with my friends. My therapists at the Neuro Institute re-evaluated me when I came back. They were so excited to see my growth. Before I only had sensation or movement from my bra strap area up. I now have muscles that contract all down my back to my waist. I also have side muscles that are contracting and more abs. Also, like you saw in the videos I have leg movements. Right now they are weak muscle contractions in many muscles in my legs. I need to make these stronger. I am hoping for the stem cells to help connect even more muscles so I can hopefully walk someday. I was having Scott check out where I felt him touching me and I can now feel lower than I use to. I can now feel him touching down almost to my waist, by my lower ribs.

We really enjoyed the time with the boys after not seeing them for so long! They were out of school for two weeks right when we got back so we had fun spending lots of time with them.

It has now been a month since I received all of my stem cells. As we have stated before, we anticipate seeing most of the results of the stem cells in the 3rd to 6th months after treatment. I will continue to work hard to help the stem cells work and give them every opportunity to heal the damage and make new connections.

On top of all of the therapy, when I can make it work, I'm also having fun volunteering my teaching abilities. I help out at Hunter's school Desert Mountain, at Brisas (where I used to teach) in a 1st and a Kindergarten class, and I also help out in a friend's Kindergarten class at Queen Creek Elementary. I would also help out in Parker's Middle School but the teachers don't seem to need as much help as they get older. He is growing up so darn fast. :(

I do love having some time to be in the classrooms. I just love to see the kids' smiling faces when I get to help them. It's fun!

Again, thank you so much for all you love, support, and prayers. Please continue to pray for my healing as this is a long process. We will continue to update the blog as I make more progress. We look forward to seeing all of you, hopefully real soon!

Welcome Home

2009-09-27T15:52:00.003-07:00

We had a small group at Sky Harbor last night to welcome Trish & Scott home. It sure was great to see them both after a month.

They both looked great and were relieved to get home after a month out of the country.

I am sure we will hear more from them on their exploits as well as the continued physical therapy Trish plans to pursue.

Our Last Week Here

2009-09-24T21:31:00.002-07:00

We were excited to be heading into the last week for therapies and injections. We feel so blessed to be having this experience. Trish is focused on pushing herself even further each week and started the week with a bang. Again, she gets to work out with her therapist two hours a day at least 4 times a week. We wish she could work out this much with her therapists at home, but it doesn’t work that way once we are back to using our insurance. She will do it at least 2-3 times a week for one hour sessions. That is all that our insurance will allow. So Trish will also work out with her friends and we will put to use things that we learned here so she can work out at home also. The therapists here have been great. We have had the opportunity to work with several girls and we love them all. They all bring their own techniques and styles and we have learned from all of them. This week Trish has had the opportunity to work with a different therapist named May. The things she has Trish doing are amazing. She focuses a lot on the mental side of things, getting your brain to connect with your muscles. This is so important for Spinal Cord Injury patients. The way she explains things really clicked with us. She stresses “WTF” (she is quick to point out, “not the bad meaning!”) what she means is Watching, Thinking, and Feeling. When you are trying to reconnect things you need to be able to see the movement you are trying to do (they always use a mirror), you need to be thinking and concentrating on what muscle you’re going to be using to do these movement, and finally you need to feel these movements. Trish can’t feel her legs moving so it is important for her to feel where her muscle is contracting with her hand. This is all so important as Trish has not done these movements in over 2 years. She also stresses the point that therapy happens all day every day. If Trish stops and thinks about it she can make any normal life activity a therapy activity. In every movement that Trish does, she needs to push herself to do more and more with her core and legs. For example, instead of just picking up her legs and moving them around, she needs to think about the movement and concentrate on the specific muscle needed to make the movement.

Trish has been pushing herself very hard throughout this whole experience and it really shows. Her core strength has greatly improved. You can see this in everything that she does. We have learned that even though her connections and muscles in the legs are weak right now, she needs to use her strong muscles (her core) to help her weak muscles work. To that end, this week Trish has been moving all over on the mat without touching her legs, something she has never done. She was even able to get down to her knees on the ground by herself without touching her legs and then was able to get herself back up onto the mat when the mat is 2 feet off the ground again without touching her legs the whole time. During all this the therapist just watched her and gave no help but told her to figure it out! It was amazing to watch Trish be able to do this. This is really hard to explain, but it was so cool to watch. My description doesn’t do justice to how hard this is! For the whole day on Wednesday Trish wasn’t allowed to touch her legs with her hands, they were enemies for the day! She also had to move herself from a sitting position along the side of the mat/table all the way to the other side around a corner without touching her legs. The therapist and I and of course Trish herself were so proud.

Trish has also been standing for nearly an hour each day for the last few therapy days. It has gotten easier for her to find her perfect position. When everything lines up just right Trish is able to put more weight on her legs and less in her arms. She has to work hard to relax her neck and arms because it is very tough to mentally think about how to connect and contract all of her muscle needed to stand up. On Wednesday she was able to repeatedly go from a sitting position to standing tall with only someone to lock her knees. There was always a therapist behind her to help guide her if needed. As Trish is finding her good P&A (Posture and Alignment – another term used by May) quicker, she is able to spend more time standing, which she loves.

Trish had her last therapy on Thursday. Everyone is so proud of how hard Trish worked and how much she has been able to accomplish while she was here. It was hard to say goodbye to all of the therapists. She has bonded a lot with some of them. They want to keep in contact so she can share her progress along her new journey at home.

Trish also had 2 injections this week that went well. These injections were stem cells that were derived from her bone marrow. She also got 2 IV’s of the bone marrow stem cells as well. The main difference in these injections is that the cord blood injections and IV’s consist of about 9 million stem cells. The bone marrow injections contained 20 million stem cells each and the IV’s contained 40 million stem cells each. By the time everything was done Trish received a combined 16 injections. She had 10 in her spine and 6 IV’s. We can’t wait to see the results of the stem cells on Trish’s body. Again, it can take between 4-6 months to see what the results will be. So in the meantime Trish will be working out hard and maintaining her “Hope”. We believe that more good will come out of this. Trish wants other Spinal Cord Injury Patients to hear her story so they too will at least have another option to try if they choose to.

We are excited to go home on Saturday. We miss our boys, family, friends, and pets.

We will also miss all the wonderful people that we have met on this incredible journey.

We had a farewell dinner with some of our friends.

A Day in the Jungle

2009-09-23T11:45:00.009-07:00

Sunday was a special day as it was Scott’s birthday. Plus, this was our last weekend here. So, for our last adventure here I decided to take Scott on a trip through the jungles of Costa Rica. All Scott wanted for his birthday was to see some monkeys in the wild! The trip was amazing! The area we were headed to was on the Atlantic side, which is also on the Caribbean. It is a 3 ½ hour drive to the coast that takes you through rain forests. Our driver (guide) was extremely knowledgeable about Costa Rica and its history. The place we went is called Tortuguero. Tortuguero is a small village surrounded by canals, or rivers. The village is only accessible by boat. Once we got to the boat on the Tortuguero canals it was about a 2 ½ hour trip to the village. Along the way we saw lots of neat animals including a crocodile, spider monkeys, Jesus Christ lizards (the ones that run on the water with their back feet), white faced monkeys, and even bats. The monkey families we saw were great. They were running around and leaping from tree to tree without a care in the world. There were also a couple of babies hanging on tight to their mom's backs. The river and jungle was so secluded that we felt like we were explorers seeing this land for the first time, it was incredible.

We got to the town of Tortuguero and had a wonderful Costa Rican lunch at one of the small resorts there. After lunch we headed to the beach on the Atlantic side. Tortuguero is located on a small strip of land with the ocean on one side and the river on the other. We were able to walk/wheel from the river to the ocean in about ten minutes. Tortuguero is also known for its turtle nesting grounds. September is the end of the season where turtles come up on shore at night and lay their eggs. While walking on the beach (thank goodness for my off road tires) we saw several nests and even a fresh set of tracks from where a turtle had headed back to the ocean the night before.

Then it was back on the boat and another 2 ½ hour trip back to the van. We took different canals on the way back and saw a lot more animals including a sloth, a huge iguana (probably 6 feet long and fat), another family of spider monkeys, several birds, and a caiman. On the way back we also saw another Jesus Christ lizard and the guide was able to get him to run on the water. It was over in an instant, but really cool to see!

We got back in the van and had a 3 ½ hour drive back to San Jose. It was a long day, but well worth the trip. Scott could not have asked for a more memorable birthday!

Here comes a few of the cool pictures we took!

This is a banana plantation. They were everywhere. The bananas are covered by the blue bags.

This boa constrictor was road kill on the way up. Poor thing.

Here is the boat that took us through the canal and jungle.

We were amazed to see the variety of vegetation which included a lot of palm trees and canopy trees, and vines mixed together.

Here is the crocodile.

One of the many spider monkey we saw. We were told that when the villagers weren't looking, the spider monkeys would steal their stuff like bags or lunches.

Look at the bottom of the picture for the white faced monkey. These were very close and at eye level. We were told that it is rare to see them this close. They were very playful.

Here is another shot look closely in the vines.

This is one of the several Jesus Christ lizards we saw. They are called this because they run on the water with their back feet.

A shot of one of the canals we went down.

Look close. These are bats hanging upside down on the trunk of a tree.

Here is part of the village of Tortuguero.

This is our boat parked for lunch.

Look closely and you will see a couple of turtle nests from the nesting grounds. The sand on this coast is black because it is formed by volcanic rock.

This is a cool coconut tree.

One of the iguanas we saw. This one was small at about 3 feet long. Not coming close to the big one we saw in the trees.

Here we are on the Caribbean coast.

There were lots of turkey voltures around, we felt right at home!

Here is the sloth hanging upside down. It didn't move the whole time we watched it.

The jungle is beautiful. We are so thankful for such a great day.

Ups & Downs

2009-09-19T14:20:00.002-07:00

Trish woke up to her worst nerve pain day so far. It was hard to get motivated for therapies and treatment today. Usually when her nerve pain escalates like this it is an indication that her body is fighting something, usually an infection. She has had a sore throat for the last couple of days so we called the Dr. and asked if they would take a look at her while we were at the hospital.

Therapy went good. They spent a lot of time stretching due to the increase in nerve pain and spasms. Then it was back to work on her core strength and balance. Trish’s core and balance are really improving. We are really starting to notice some changes. The greatest is that the muscles all down her back are working! She still doesn’t feel them when I touch them, but when she flexes they are starting to flex all down her back and sides! She is so excited to have these working and to start getting them stronger so she can sit up straighter. She also had a very different feeling down her abdominal muscles today. She said it is hard to explain, but that she feels them working from the inside all the way down to her belly button! We can also start to feel small contractions 2 abs lower than normal. This is all very great and exciting progress!

The second hour of therapy was spent in the pool. They do a lot of the same exercises as on the mat and standing up, but everything is easier since there is less resistance. Trish enjoyed it, but prefers working outside of the pool. I took a lot of video so that we can continue this therapy in our pool once we get home.

After therapy it was off to another injection. Dr. Thomas also looked at Trish’s throat. You know it isn’t good when the Dr. says, “Oh, wow, that’s bad.” So she has strep and they gave her antibiotics to kick it. The injection went fine, plus she got another IV treatment. There was some confusion with the drivers so we ended up sitting in the hospital for an hour longer than we were supposed to, but Trish was still laying down so it wasn’t that big of a deal. We got home and she did her 5 hours of rest and then sat up with no headache. She felt sick and achy so she just went to bed for the night.

We are planning on hanging around the hotel on Saturday and maybe later going downtown to the shops and market. Most of Trish and I want to make sure she gets lots of rest to get better so she can finish with a strong last week! If she feels OK on Sunday we are planning on heading to the Atlantic side of the country. This is on the Caribbean and is suppose to be a very dense rain forest with lots of wildlife.

Out for a swim!

2009-09-18T08:57:00.001-07:00

Thursday was a therapy day. They again worked Trish very hard. She spent a lot of time standing in the walker again. This time I got to help a lot both holding her knees and supporting her back. She felt very comfortable standing and was having an easier time finding her position. This allows her to take some pressure off her arms. She is still working on putting more weight on her legs, focusing on tightening her legs, abs, and butt, while relaxing her arms and shoulders. That’s a lot to think about! She also got to work with a new therapist, Angie. We really liked Angie, she is tough!

After therapy Trish had a dentist appointment. As soon as we stepped out to go to the dentist, the skies really opened up and it started pouring rain! It looked like we would swim to the dentist today! I got Trish loaded into the cab literally standing in a river that was running down the street. By the time I got her wheelchair taken apart and loaded into the trunk of the cab it looked like I had gotten out of a pool with all my clothes on. Just part of the experience I guess. It was raining so hard that it was difficult to see out of the windshield, plus the windows were foggy so Trish was constantly wiping it with a rag for the driver so he could see. We got to the dentist and it was still pouring, so getting Trish up the 2 flights of stairs was interesting, but of course we got it done. The dentist staff was again so nice. They got us towels to dry off and once Trish was in the dentist chair they put her chair under a hand dryer to dry off the seat cushion. The rain stopped as quickly as it had started and the rest of the evening was very nice.

Trish wanted me to say hi to everyone and thank you for all your thoughts and prayers. She also wanted to give a special shout out to Mrs. Ehlers’ homeroom class who has been following the blog daily!

Another day

2009-09-17T09:55:00.002-07:00

Wednesday was yet another therapy and injection day. We had an early schedule so it was therapy from 9:00 to 11:00 and then an injection t 12:00. Everything went well. Trish stood up in a walker today and looked great! She felt very comfortable this time and I even got the chance to help her stand later in the session by locking her knees for her. I love it when I get to participate in the therapies. The therapist supporting her back is Catalina, who is one of our favorites.

The injection went just fine. Back at the hotel she did her 5 hours of rest, which went pretty fast this time and then got up for dinner and a movie in our room. That’s all for now!

Turtle Island

2009-09-17T09:23:00.006-07:00

Trish was feeling good and we had the day off Tuesday so we headed to the beach for the day. We went to a place called Turtle Island and it was amazing. We had a chance to go snorkeling while we were there. This was the first time that Trish had tried to go since she got hurt. They took us out in a little boat and we snorkeled around a small island. The attitudes of everyone here continue to amaze me. We are use to having to talk people into letting us try things like this, but here they have the attitude that sure you can go and we’ll just figure it out! We saw lots of colorful fish and Trish had no problems at all and loved it. Getting back in the boat in the middle of the ocean was a little challenging, but really not that big of a deal. We just hung out on the beach the rest of the day and relaxed! It was a great day!

Here she is, excited to go to Turtle Island, looking beautiful!

Here is Turtle Island from the distance

This is the beach we were headed to

View from our chairs on the beach

Here we are in the ocean. This is the boat that took us snorkeling. You can also see the small island that we snorkeled around.

What a view. You can see the beach chairs that we hung out in.

Here we are, relaxing on the beach with our friend Gael.

Half Way!

2009-09-14T18:24:00.005-07:00

Well. Here we are, half way through the treatment. Monday was another “typical” therapy and injection day. The first hour was spent on stretching and movement. I got another good video of Trish kicking her leg:

The movement of her legs is still exciting to see. However, we do keep it in perspective and realize that a lot more muscles need to connect in order for her to be able to move her legs in any other position other than lying on a mat with minimal resistance. She still does not have any movement while she is just sitting in her chair. Of course we hold out hope that through therapy and the stem cell treatments this will change!

She stood in the parallel bars again today, but it was with different therapists whose technique for helping her was different. This made it a lot more difficult for Trish and a lot more tiring. Still, it is good to see her stand up.

The therapy sessions here are really intense both mentally and physically. Trish is sure glad that she started therapy at the Neuro Institute in Tempe a few weeks before coming to Costa Rica. The Dr.'s here continue to stress the importance of continuing therapy when Trish gets home and she is looking forward to working with her therapists there too.

Trish’s nerve pain and muscle spasm were up again today, but we are taking this as a good sign that things are starting to try and reconnect.

The injection went fine. They seem to have issue with getting an IV into Trish, which they have to do about once a week. Today was one of those days and it took a couple of tries to get it in. Today Trish got a back injection and an IV injection of stem cells. You know the routine, back to the hotel for the 5 hours of rest to let those stem cells start working!

Tuesday, 9/15/09 is Costa Rica’s Independence Day. Nobody works so we get the day off. If Trish is feeling well, we are planning on going to a little island they call Turtle Island. It's called this because of the shape of the island, not because there are lots of turtles on it. Anyway, it looks like a tropical paradise with white sand beaches and all.

Trish is up with no headache following her injection so it looks like we are headed to the beach tomorrow to relax!

Off to the Beach!

2009-09-13T21:16:00.009-07:00

Well today the sun was shining and it was beautiful out so we rented a car and headed off to Jaco Beach. This is a very popular place to go on the Pacific Coast. We drove about 2 ½ hours to get there. It was a beautiful drive through the mountains and the rainforest. We saw some beautiful waterfalls along the way.

When we got there we went straight out to the water. Scott put on my mountain bike tires before we left so I can go a lot more places. The beach was sandy but also had lots of small rocks mixed in with the sand. Because of this, Scott was able to wheel me right out to the water. Wow! The water was nice. It felt as warm as our pool in the summer.

There were some guys renting surf boards and I told Scott he should go. He had surfed once before when he was a teenager and loved it. He was excited and found out that he could go out for 2 hours and have lessons along the way. The waves were big today. They were about 5 to 6 feet tall. He loved it and did great. It was so much fun watching him. The weather was beautiful. It actually got a little warm today. We got some sun and it was nice.

Look at the cute little surfer boy!

After surfing we went up and down the street and looked at the shops. It was fun. Later we went to lunch and my temporary front tooth fell out! Oh my! I sure look goofy without it! Scott wanted me to post a picture but I said no way! :) (Remember that I decided to finally get my crown replaced since it is so much cheaper here.) Well, at least we were almost done at the beach anyway.

As we drove home it started raining. The clouds were low and the fog crept in too. We had to drive home surrounded by fog. We sure couldn’t see far. It was much like being in the middle of an Arizona dust storm. We stopped at a little coffee shop that a friend recommended that overlooked the ocean and the rain forest. We only saw fog out the windows, but the company was still nice.

Past this fog is the ocean and there is a big canyon in the middle of the rain forest below it.

When Scott returned the car, I called my dentist Dr. Marco to let him know about my tooth. He was so nice and upset that it came out that he wanted to come right over to our hotel to put it back in for me. It was late and I didn’t want him to have to come right in the middle of his Saturday night. He said he would have trouble sleeping knowing that I needed my tooth fixed, but we agreed that he could come in the morning. He came over after getting home from church with his family and I’m no longer toothless. :) Like Scott said before. The care from the doctors & dentists is amazing. Could you imagine getting a house call on a Sunday morning in the US?

I miss the boys sooooooooooo much! It is so hard being away from them this long. The longest I have ever been away from them before was one week. We get to talk to them each day using Skype on the webcam. It’s fun being able to see them. They’re both happy and doing good in school and having lots of fun with football. This is both of their 1st years playing tackle football. They love it. I can’t wait to be able to give them big hugs again.

Here is a picture from a camping trip this summer.

We just stayed around the hotel on Sunday. My nerve pain was very intense today. For those of you who don’t know, even though I can’t feel from the chest down I have constant burning/tingling nerve pain below my injury line that varies in intensity, but that has been there every day since my injury. The doctors say that this could be a good sign of the nerves trying to heal. I have talked to a few other spinal cord injury patients who have had stem cell treatment and most of them said that their nerve pain got worse before it got better. One of my biggest hopes is for it to go away.

We were able to watch a little football today, but the announcers where in Spanish! We also decided to go up to the park. We got a light rain while we were out. I have learned to take my umbrella with me everywhere since the weather can change so fast.Well I’m getting ready for a busy week with more physical therapy and three injections. Bye for now.

Saturday

2009-09-12T06:39:00.001-07:00

Just wanted to put up a quick post to let everyone know that Trish is up and feeling good after having her bone marrow aspiration and another injection on Friday. So, we are off to the beach for a nice relaxing day! Have a great weekend everyone!

Catching up!

2009-09-11T12:59:00.007-07:00

Sorry for not posting for the last couple of days, but things have been really busy. First, let me say that we have been overwhelmed by the response to the videos! It's an awesome thing to see and we are so happy and excited that it is touching so many people. I will try to get new video as often as possible!

Wednesday was another therapy and injection day. This time Trish had therapy early in the morning followed by an injection around 12:30. Therapy was very intense again working on moving her legs, strengthening her core, and working on balance. She worked extremely hard and was completely spent by the end of the therapy. This was also Trish's first time standing with the parallel bars. She has one person locking her knees and and another supporting her from behind. Doesn't she look great?

The injection at this time of day made it more difficult for Trish to go home and do her 5 hour rest period. She was up right at the 5 hour mark and continued her streak of no headache! We decided that we prefer the late afternoon injections so that Trish can just plan on spending the rest of the night in bed.

Thursday started with me getting caught up on some laundry. Lucky for Trish the washer and dryer is down stairs so I just had to do it! She always does the laundry at home and she is the one working so hard here that she definitely deserves the break! Then we were off to therapy. They continue to push Trish farther and farther each session and it is great, she loves it! Her muscles were definitely tired as the movements were smaller today, but she was still impressive. They had her stand again between the parallel bars. This time they did it with just 2 people, one to lock her knees and the other to put pressure on her hips. They worked with her quite a bit on standing. They would start by getting her up and getting her knees locked. Then the person behind her would slowly release the pressure on her hips until she had completely let go. At this point Trish was standing with only the help of having her knees locked! Then Trish would slowly relax her shoulders and arms and take as much pressure off her hands as she could. At times she would just be lightly touching the bars for balance, it was an awesome sight. It was also very impressive to see her as her body would start to shift out of position; she was able to bring it back into line on her own. The therapist said that they were seeing some really good contractions in her muscles. Here she is!

Look at the determined look on her face and that great posture!

The director of the therapy facility has also taken an interest in Trish. She talked to us for quite a while after therapy Thursday. She was very encouraging saying that she is confident that Trish is going to do great! She is very encouraged by the amount of contractions that Trish is having in her muscle and she just knows that great things are ahead for Trish! We have heard several stories of a guy down here named Juan Carlos who was injured about 18 months ago, had his spinal cord severed, received the stem cell treatment and therapy and is now able to walk. We got to meet him after therapy! I must admit when we heard the stories we pictured him in leg braces struggling to walk with a walker or something along those lines. To our amazement he walks completely on his own and looks “normal”. He uses canes/crutches for some balance, but this is more of a precaution than a necessity. We were absolutely amazed and inspired by him. He did get his stem cell treatment sooner after his injury than Trish is, but I can’t explain how great it is to meet this success story in person! Here is a picture of Trish and Juan Carlos.

After therapy we were off to another appointment. Since we have been down here we have heard that the dental care is exceptional and very inexpensive. Trish has needed some dental work for quite some time now (a new crown) so we decided to look into it. Well, it is at least 1/3 of the cost that she has been quoted back in the states. We decided that now she can get it done. This dental office has lots of American patients. Many of them fly down here just for the excellent treatment at a very low price. We were comforted when we walked in, the waiting room was full of Americans. So, the rest of our limited free time is going to be spent at the dentist! At least they have comfortable chairs in the waiting room! The dentist is very nice and accommodating and we continue to be impressed by the level of care in Costa Rica! We didn’t leave the dentist until nearly 7:00 Thursday night so we grabbed a quick bite to eat, headed home, and crashed!

Friday is a big hospital day for us. I haven’t mentioned this part before because we wanted to get all the details ironed out. When we met with Dr. Riordon (the head of ICM) last week he asked if we would be interested in trying some bone marrow stem cell treatments in addition to the cord blood treatments. He explained that they have had good success in other clinics in other countries using bone marrow stem cells on spinal cord injury patients and that they have been contemplating adding it to the spinal cord injury protocol here. They have also been successfully using bone marrow stem cells here at ICM to treat traumatic brain injuries as well as diabetes, among other things. There are no negative side effects from this treatment and it will be done in addition to the 8 cord blood injections and 4 cord blood stem cell IV’s. So we said YES! We are so excited to be the first to try this at ICM, what an opportunity! We did ask if this would cost us any more and Dr. Riordon said, “Not if I tell them not to charge you anything!” It’s great to have connections, thanks again Sherry! So I am sitting here in the waiting room as they are in doing Trish’s bone marrow aspiration. This consists of taking marrow from the back side of each of her hips. They will take the marrow today and send it to the lab to be processed and tested before preparing the stem cells to be injected into Trish’s spinal fluid. Trish will be getting two injections of her own stem cells. These injections will occur the last week of treatment. Plus, they are taking more marrow than they need, but less than they would take for a bone marrow transplant. They will store the excess marrow in case Trish can ever use it.

Here's Trish ready to go into surgery for the bone marrow aspiration. Cute! I especially loved the booties and hat!

After the aspiration Trish has an injection this afternoon at 4:30. I’m sure she will be exhausted tonight! If she feels OK we are planning on trying to get to the beach this weekend to see yet another side of Costa Rica!

After 2 hours she is out of surgery and doing great! Now we just need to wait for her next injection in about an hour. We'll let you know how it goes!

We Have Video!!

2009-09-09T19:29:00.008-07:00

Tuesday was a therapy day and again, therapy was great. Trish did a lot of the same things, working on movement in her legs and also on balance. We finally got a camera cable (thanks Mom!) so you can see some examples of the movements we have been seeing!

Here is Trish working on sitting up straight using her arms as little as possible. This is hard to do with limited abs and back muscles. She looks great!

Here are some video clips of Trish moving her legs in different directions. In all of the exercises she is concentrating extremely hard on the movement they are asking her to do. It is very important that her brain make the connection to the movement that they are working on. They spend a lot of time explaining what the movement is and what muscle she needs to concentrate on to make it move. This is all very challenging considering she hasn't thought about these movements for over 2 years! She tries very hard to keep her arms in close to her so she doesn't use them. She is also trying to use as little of her upper body as possible.

The clip below shows the therapist adding some resistance for the first time. The therapists have been very impressed with Trish's effort, attitude, determination, and progress! Of course I am impressed too, but by now I have come to expect it!

Also today, they had Trish stand up for the first time here! Trish has stood using a standing frame before, but the frame provides a lot of support and Trish really doesn’t need to work to stand up. In therapy today they had her stand using a basic frame with nothing supporting her front or back. The only support was two therapists keeping her legs locked! They also had her practice shifting her weight from side to side. They would also unlock one of her knees and she would bring it back into the locked position. It was very impressive and took a lot out of her.

You can tell by the serious look on her face in the picture below how hard she has to concentrate to hold a standing position. It sure is great to be able to see her stand tall again!

Later that night a few of the “stemmies” felt good enough to meet up. Stemmies is the name that they have given those down here for stem cell treatment. We were excited because it was really our first night out since we have been here. We met up for drinks (no alcohol for the stemmies as it could affect the stem cells) and some good conversation then onto the restaurant for a nice Italian dinner. It was great to get out!

Here we are. It is also great to see all the family support for all the people down here getting treatment. What a great group of people we are meeting.

Monday, back to work!

2009-09-08T09:31:00.004-07:00

We were back on schedule Monday with physical therapy from 12:00 to 2:00 and an injection at 2:30. Trish will actually be getting 3 injections each week for the next 2 weeks. Trish is doing awesome in therapy as they continue to work with her on moving her legs and also on her core strength and balance. The movement of her legs continues to amaze me. Here are some pictures of Trish working on her balance and core in therapy. They have her hold herself up on her knees using the workout ball to balance. This is extremely hard with virtually no abdominal muscles. It takes a lot of strength and concentration.

Here she is after working on this exercise for a while. They are really working her hard, but she loves it because she loves to push herself! With all the working out, Trish is developing a really tight muscle in her back, under her shoulder blade that is giving her a fair amount of discomfort. This same muscle actually locked-up on her when she was first in the hospital after her accident. We are doing lots of stretching to try and avoid this happening again. The therapists are very good not to push her too hard when it starts tightening and they help to stretch it out.

The therapists said that they will also work with Trish in the pool, so we will add that to our schedule next week. Even before coming here we have heard lots of positive things about pool therapy because of the minimal resistance that you have in a pool. This makes it much easier for your legs to move, if they can.

After therapy we grabbed some tortilla soup at the cafeteria for lunch and headed to the injection. They always have me put on a hair net and mask. Trish thought you all would like to see so here you go.

The injection went smoothly again and we were out of the hospital by 4:00 and headed back to the hotel. Trish laid down in the back seat to try and help prevent any headache. Back at the hotel Trish did her mandatory 6 hours of lying on her back. After 6 hours she sat up and was headache free! However, we don’t want to push things so we just went to bed for the night. Trish woke up Tuesday morning feeling good so we are looking forward to another good day of therapy.

Also, some of you have asked for the address where we are staying so I added it to the side bar. The addresses are very interesting here. They give directions and the often use landmarks, some of which aren't even here anymore. They are not true street addresses. For instance the hotel address indicates that we are 300 meters north of the ICE plant (power company) in San Jose, Costa Rica. A lot of other addresses refer to GPS coordinates.

Off to the Volcano

2009-09-07T10:00:00.014-07:00

I’m excited to have a weekend free and to be feeling good. I want to take advantage of this time and go out and see some sights of beautiful Costa Rica. We left early Saturday morning with some friends that we met here and headed up to see the Arenal Volcano. One of our drivers that takes us to my P.T. sessions and my injections name is Javier. He is a great guy and once he learned that we wanted to go to the Arenal Volcano he recommended that we stay the night up there because it’s the rainy season here the roads can get really slick at night. He said we should stay at Los Lagos. It’s about a 3 ½ hour drive away from our Hotel. There are 3 different volcanoes around here and we were excited to see this one because it is what you picture when you think of a volcano. It hasn't blown its top so it is cone shaped. It was nice driving across the beautiful countryside up to the mountains.

We saw many little towns along the way. We also noticed lots of cattle grazing in fields. We stopped on the way and had a Costa Rican lunch. It was great to try the real Costa Rican food. We loved it! Once we got to the town of Fortuna where the volcano is located it was so cloudy we didn’t even know which side the volcano was on. The rooms were very cheap here, our room was the best room you could get and it was only $85. It has a full view of the volcano. At night you can usually see the lava flow, but it was too cloudy the night we were there. This resort is beautiful it reminds us of being in paradise.

We dropped off our stuff and headed up to the sky tram that takes you on a tour through the canopy of the rain forest near the volcano. The sky tram is basically a basket on a cable that holds about five people, kind of like a ski lift, but I could wheel right on and the guys could either sit on benches or stand up. We were in awe of how beautiful the rain forest was! We could hear Howler Monkeys in the distance as we continued to climb to the top. There was also an amazing lake that stretched out over the land. Once we got to the top we were greeted by a man who handed us iced tea. There was a huge platform at the top where we hung out and enjoyed the views.

Below is the pathway that the tram takes through the rainforest.

If you look closely in the picture below you can see what our tram looked like.

Here you can see the smoke coming off the left side of the volcano.

It has always been a dream of mine, even before I was inured to zip line in Costa Rica. Since I have been here I have been trying to find a place that could get me up to the cables to do this. We have tried many places but haven’t found one yet. When we were on the platform we realized that you can zip line from platform to platform back down the mountain. There are 10 platforms with the cables being as high as 460 feet above the ground and reaching lengths of nearly ½ mile! We saw a group go from the 1st platform and it was incredible to see how fast they flew down the cable! There is no walking necessary and the guides said I would have no problem doing it. At the very end they said they could repel me down from a bridge, which is the last platform. We wanted to go that day, but there were no more tours available so they booked us for the morning. The anticipation of finally getting to go has us feeling like kids waiting for Christmas morning. We drove back to the hotel for the night. The next morning we woke up to sheets of rain and it was so cloudy and foggy that we couldn’t see the base of the volcano. We waited for it to pass, but it never did so we had to cancel our zip line tour :(. We hope to find another one in the future that will work for me.

To make the best of the day we bought rain ponchos and headed out to see the exhibits at the hotel. We saw crocodiles, a butterfly garden, a frog exhibit and even an ant farm. At first we were bummed about the rain, but then we decided to enjoy the experience because it is suppose to rain in the rain forest! After seeing the exhibits, we went to the natural hot springs and the swim up bar. They had a huge pool at the hotel that was fed by a natural hot spring. The atmosphere was great. After a relaxing soak we headed for our home away from home.

Friday

2009-09-04T21:03:00.002-07:00

Today was a therapy day and we were so excited that Trish woke up after her second injection headache free. She had therapy from 12:00 to 2:00. There is an “American” mall very close to the hospital so we had the driver drop us off there so we could walk around for a few hours. They have several of the same stores that we have in the U.S. and most of the same brands. The only difference is that everything cost nearly twice as much so we really didn’t buy anything other than a couple of souvenirs. One difference is that they have a grocery store in the mall, so we did pick up a few more things for “home”.

After the mall we headed home. The place we are staying is great. There are several other people here that are in various stages of their stem cell treatments. It is really a little community and we enjoy the interaction with the other families going through the treatment. Most of the people being treated are here for M.S. and their stories of improvement are great. There is also a child here that has autism and we are hearing that they have been very successful in treating this. Bye for now.

Injection #2

2009-09-04T20:14:00.005-07:00

The schedule for Thursday was physical therapy from 12:00 to 2:00 followed by the second injection at 2:30 p.m. Trish was feeling good this morning (the headache has subsided) so we had breakfast at the hotel and headed to the park for a stroll. The breakfast is included and is absolutely fantastic every day. The park was much less crowded than on the weekend, but it was really nice to get out and walk around after being in the room for a day and a half! There are some amazing trees here. When the bark peels off the trees are bright green, orange, red, and purple. Trish took a couple of pictures.

The park is truly amazing. It is huge with a lake in the middle, trails all over, several fields for playing soccer, a roller balding rink and even an indoor pool for water polo! The best part is that all of this is right in the middle of town!

We got back from the park just in time to catch our ride to the hospital for therapy and the 2nd injection. Therapy was good. I am amazed at the things they are doing with Trish! Their main focus is to see what, if any, function she has below her injury line and work to further develop it. Much to our surprise, Trish can actually move her legs slightly!! The therapists set her up so that there was no resistance on her legs and then asked her to move them in various directions. She can actually move them! We were shocked! The movement is relatively small, 12 inches or less, but this is more than I have ever seen her do. She has moved her legs a few inches in many different positions. It is really neat to see this therapy at work. They make Trish keep her upper body still and try not to use any muscles above her injury level. Then she needs to concentrate extremely hard on the movement they are asking her to do. Usually, the first few tries show very little movement, then it is like the muscles start to figure it out and they move really well. Finally, the muscles fatigue and the movement slows down. We will post video clips of this in the future, but are having issues getting the video clips downloaded right now. The therapists told us that they focus on identifying everything that the patient has and then work with that and that most people that come here don’t even realize that they have as much movement as they really do. This is definitely the case with Trish!

An incredible thing (sign) happened during therapy. Dr. Neil Riordon came up to us and asked us if we were from Arizona. We said yes and he said “I got an email about you today that said I should come find you and talk to you” (Thanks Sherry!). Neil is the scientist behind the treatment that is administered at ICM. This is his clinic! After therapy was over we went to lunch with Neil and it was truly a privilege to spend this much time with him. Listening to him talk about stem cell and the research and potential for its use was amazing! After lunch he came with us to Trish’s injection! Talk about feeling like you have the world’s best advocate with you! He stayed with us right up until she got her injection. Trish received an injection in her back and also an injection through an IV. The theory is that this delivers the stem cells through another pathway to help repair the damage. Here is a picture of Trish with Dr. Riordon outside the hospital:

As I said, the injections went fine and we made the trip back to the hotel for Trish to begin her mandatory rest period. It is so hard for her to lay flat on her back, not on her side as she likes for 6 hours. Just to play it safe, she stayed in bed the rest of the night until morning. She woke up headache free! We were both so excited.

Trish's First Injection

2009-09-02T11:20:00.001-07:00

Well, Tuesday was Trish’s first injection! It was scheduled at 2:30 so we just hung around the hotel in the morning before heading over to the hospital. We had lunch at a really good Chinese restaurant right next door! We were worried that we wouldn’t be able to read the menu, but were pleasantly surprised that many restaurants have English on their menus.

The hospital where all of the procedures are done is very nice and looks just like any of our hospitals back in the states. Most of the people speak English so communication really hasn’t been an issue. We met Dr. Afonso who is the anesthesiologist that does the actual injections. He was very nice and took his time talking to us. He is also a pain management specialist so we talked to him quite a bit about Trish’s nerve pain. Unfortunately he really didn’t have any new suggestions for us. The injection went very well and Trish didn’t feel a thing. The actual procedure took less than 10 minutes. We left the hospital shortly after the injection and headed back to the hotel for Trish’s mandatory 4 to 5 hours of laying flat on her back. This is required for 2 reasons, first to help prevent a spinal headache and second to help allow the stem cells to migrate up the spinal column. The injection takes place in the spinal fluid at the base of the spine and the stem cells will migrate to where she has inflammation.

About 3 hours into her rest, Trish started getting a headache. It got worse at night and was still bad this morning. We called the clinic and the head Dr. actually came right over to our hotel to check on Trish! It was amazing. We usually wait longer than this in our normal Dr.’s waiting rooms! Dr. Lara was not too concerned and actually administered 2 shots to help with the headache and ordered Trish to relax for another 4 hours. It has been really hard for Trish to stay in bed for nearly 24 hours! She is so bored! Thank goodness we have HBO and it’s in English. So we will hang low today and make up the physical therapy session later in the week. Injection number 2 is tomorrow so be praying for a better recovery!

Getting Started!

2009-09-01T10:59:00.005-07:00

We found out Monday morning that they were moving us to a little more accessible room so Trish could get her wheelchair into the bathroom. So we made sure everything was packed back up. This is what it looks like to pack for a month! Crazy huh!

Next we headed out for our first appointment. This was at the clinic where you fill out your paperwork and Trish had to give 8 tubes of blood! They use the serum from her blood to mix with the cord blood stem cells. This makes up the mixture that is injected. All of the Doctors and staff are very nice and easy to talk to.

After our initial visit to the clinic it was back to the hotel where we got to check out our new room. It’s great. It has 2 bedrooms and Trish can fit in the bathroom. It is just like an apartment.

Later in the morning we hooked up with two guys that are also here for treatment (one has MS). They had rented a car and they invited us to come along on a drive around the countryside, which was really neat to see. The scenery is beautiful, as the city is built in the mountains. There are lots of neat looking trees and beautiful flowers and plants.

Later in the day Trish had her first therapy session. Each of her sessions will be 2 hours long and she has 4 sessions every week. The first part of the therapy was an evaluation. Then they really got to work and worked her very hard. After therapy we came back “home” and relaxed for a while and then headed out to the supermarket. Shopping sure was interesting! We miss the food that they have in the US grocery stores. Things are just different. The brands are different, the selection smaller, and most everything is in Spanish! We managed to get enough food so that we can make a lot of our meals here. That’s all for now, Trish gets her first injection Tuesday afternoon.

Our first full day in Costa Rica

2009-08-30T17:25:00.003-07:00

There is a beautiful park about 3 blocks up the road from the hotel so we decided to take a stroll up to it. It was an adventure just getting to the park as the road is a steep grade, there were several potholes, and the curbs are up to a foot high! Once we made it to the park it was beautiful. The park was full of families and there were lots of people of all ages playing futbol (soccer). It was neat to see how family oriented everybody seemed. There were people ziplining through the trees, riding horses and ponies through the park, and people fishing in the lake with no fishing poles. There were a few vendors around, but it is nothing like Mexico. They don't actively try to sell you stuff and we have been told that they don't negotiate the price. Sorry we forgot the camera in the room, but I'm sure we will be back and we'll post some pictures then. We later had dinner at a restaurant next to our hotel. It was funny to get the bill and see we were paying $16,350 for dinner, good thing the exchange rate is about 580 to $1. So it was really only about $27. We are excited and anxious for my first appointment with ICM at 8:00 tomorrow morning. It will consist of blood work and they will also go over my treatment plan with me. Bye for now.

We made it to Costa Rica!

2009-08-30T16:40:00.005-07:00

Preparing to leave for a month is harder than we imagined! Our jouney began with a 10:00 am flight out of Phoenix. Saying goodbye to the boys was really tough, but we know that they'll be well taken care of.

We had a 2 hour flight to Dallas, a 2 hour layover, and then a 3 1/2 hour flight to Costa Rica. Everything went very smoothly. We were excited to see the landscape as we flew in, but at 7:00 at night it was already pitch black! I guess the sun sets about 5:30 here. We felt very well taken care of because there were people waiting for us at each point along the way with my name on a sign. We even got to go through customs first (one of the few perks of being in a wheelchair). The people from ICM (Institute for Cellular Medicine) were there to load us and our luggage (8 bags-a month is a long time :) ) and take us to our hotel. When we came into the room we were greeted with a beautiful flower/fruit arangement on the table. Take a look.

The room is nice, but I can't fit through the bathroom door in my wheelchair! Luckily I brought Scott along and thank goodness he's strong! They are going to look into getting us a new room tomorrow. That's all for now. We are so excited to be here!

Paralyzed Valley woman holds hope in Costa Rican treatment

2009-08-27T09:37:00.005-07:00

Paralyzed Valley woman holds hope in Costa Rican treatment - Phoenix Arizona news, breaking news, local news, weather radar, traffic from ABC15 News ABC15.com

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My New Adventure

2009-07-23T13:13:00.004-07:00

Two years ago my life was happier than it had ever been. But tragedy struck in May 2007 when my husband Scott and I were vacationing with friends in El Gulfo, Mexico. We were riding quads on the beach. The tide had gone out and Scott and I hit a sand bar that flipped us causing my injury.

As most of you know, the accident left me paralyzed from the chest down. This has been a huge challenge for us physically, emotionally, and even spiritually. Despite all of the challenges we continue to push forward and make the best of our situation. While I have tried not to let my injury slow me down, I have always maintained hope for an improvement to my condition. Until recently this hope was nothing more than a vision or dream. The doctors have told me from the beginning that even though my spinal cord was only bruised, I would never walk again and that there were no more options for me to pursue in order to get better.

I have always believed that people come into your life for a reason. A recent string of events has confirmed this. Seven months after I was paralyzed, my step father Bill was diagnosed with pancreatic cancer. He passed away six months later. I truly feel that Bill has been looking over me and he is “My Angel.” Through a dear friend of Bill’s, I have been put in contact with a non embryonic stem cell center that is currently performing miracles through stem cell treatments in Costa Rica. These treatments are not yet available in the US.

With a spinal cord injury, it is important to approach any treatment as soon as possible. I have been accepted to the clinic as a good candidate with a high probability of success from the treatment. They have had patients with severed spinal cords who have walked after these treatments. I am praying for a full recovery, but truthfully there are many things that could improve with my condition that would make this “leap of faith” a success.

Because this center is out of the country and therefore not covered by insurance, the cost of this medical procedure is significant. The cost is $30,000 dollars. This covers 8 stem cell injections into my spinal cord, and intensive physical therapy over a period of four weeks. This treatment will be performed by the Institute for Cellular Medicine.

We believe that all of this is coming together for a reason and we need to go forward with it now. This has the potential of improving the quality of my life more than you’ll ever know. I would regret it forever if I didn’t at least try this, while my injury is still young enough to have a chance to heal.

$30,000 plus our airfare and hotel is a lot of money but you can’t put a price tag on the chance to get your life back. If you wish to make a donation to the Stressman Medical Fund we are using the PayPal secure on-line service which provides you a secure method to submit a donation by using your credit card (Visa, Master Card, American Express, Discover). By using this system your credit card infomation is tightly secure. This system will also email you a detailed receipt of your donation transaction. Or, any National Bank of Arizona branch is prepared to accept a deposit into the Trish Stressman Medical Fund. The account number is 0568005203.

We will be leaving to go down to Costa Rica on August 29th. We will be posting new entries on my blog as we continue this journey towards healing.

Thank you so much for thinking of me, and praying for our family. I now have new hope for a better tomorrow.

God Bless.

Trish

Free at Last

2008-03-26T08:09:00.007-07:00

With the addition of a slighly modified Honda Odessy, Trish is now free to drive again.She drives great with her hand controls. We very much appreciate all the wonderful support Trish & Scott have received over the past 10 months. Her recovery would have been far more difficult without all your help.

Thank you.

Another Routine Week

2007-09-25T07:20:00.000-07:00

I know it has been a while since my last post, but things have been moving along in a fairly routine manner at the Stressman household.

Scott is back to his old schedule at work, the boys are into both their school routines as well as baseball for Hunter and football for Parker. Trish continues to direct the Stressman orchestra keeping track of appointments, practices, games, and all the other family responsibilities. It really does seem like each day is getting shorter and fitting everything in is becoming more difficult. But then I guess this describes the challenges faced by most modern families.

Trish continues to fight with both her nerve pain and her muscle spasms, but is working constantly with her doctors to find ways to reduce the negative impact of these on her daily life. Each week she is spending more and more time on her own, and is gaining confidence in her ability to do everything around the house.

Trish & Scott are slowly making the changes in their home that are required to enable Trish to do everything she did before the accident. So, all in all, things are well.

Newspaper Article Published

2007-08-27T07:29:00.000-07:00

The East Valley Tribune just published an article on Trish's situation. You can read the full article at http://www.eastvalleytribune.com/story/95988

A Good Week

2007-08-26T07:08:00.002-07:00

I was fortunate to be able to spend the day with Trish on Tuesday of this week. I attended her PT & OT therapy sessions at Barrows, and then drove her to her house in Queen Creek. It was her first ride in my car since before the accident, and she was able to transfer herself from her chair to the passenger seat with no difficulty.

The therapists at Barrows continue to push her to try new things, and Trish continues to make amazing progress. Each week she gains more strength and learns more mobility tricks. Her PT even had her transfer clear to the floor and back up into her chair so she could handle an emergency if she fell from her chair when she was alone. She did great. She also rode six miles on the e-stim bike that helps keep her leg muscles toned and in shape.

After we got home I was able to get a little computer work done and managed to secure their wireless computer network, and clean up some PC issues. Now Trish is back on-line with the world and taking care of the family's personal business.

More next week ...

In the Routine

2007-08-19T07:59:00.000-07:00

This week was pretty much "in the routine" and included out-patient therapy visits, a visit to Trish's school for parent's night, as well as shopping and a bunch of "hanging out at home".

We have been told by everyone at BNI that the process of recovery can last two years and sometimes longer. So sometimes we forget that Trish is only two and a half months into this process. She is doing wonderfully and has accomplished so much, but there is a while yet to go.

She did enjoy her visit to her school, and many, many of the staff, teachers, and parents were very glad to have a chance to see her and to visit.

More next week ...

Chair Lift Installed

2007-08-14T07:42:00.000-07:00

Trish is now able to get upstairs in her home thanks to the chair lift that Scott had installed. It is electrically operated and travels along a rail. Trish is able to transfer from her wheelchair to the lift, move up the stairs, and then transfer into another wheelchair at the top landing.

This now gives her access to the master bedroom, the boys bedrooms, and the master bath area. And she can now sleep in her own bedroom for the first time in almost three months.

This was a very large expense and was not covered by insurance, but was really necessary for Trish to live a normal life in her beautiful two story home.

Great Day Boating

2007-08-13T06:39:00.005-07:00

On Saturday, Trish, Scott, Parker & Hunter took their boat out to Bartlett Lake for a day of fun on the water. They were joined by four other boats and several of their new friends from St. Joseph's Hospital and the Barrows Neurological Institute.

In attendance were three of Trish's therapists from both her in-patient and out-patient experiences. Her mentor, Jennifer, was there as well.

Scott, Parker & Hunter all had runs on the wake board or tube. Trish along with the help of her therapists, was able to get in the water for a swim with the gang as well. This was pretty amazing since she just got out of the hospital a few weeks back. Now Scott knows how to help Trish get in and out of the boat on future trips.

Everyone was pretty bushed after a long day on the water and in the sun. So Sunday was a day of resting up for the new week of challenges ahead.

Good Week

2007-08-09T16:01:00.000-07:00

While Trish has been enjoying her time at home playing sports with her boys, and getting back into the swing of taking care of them full time, she has also continued working on her rehabilitation.

Today she had a great follow up visit with her surgeon, Dr. Nick Theodore at the Barrows Neurological Institute. The doctor told Trish that she was healing very fast and had made excellent progress in her PT & OT sessions. And while her struggles with the nerve pain have been frustrating, Dr. Theodore told her that this may be a good sign. He said that it proves there is some nerve communication that is traveling past the point of her spinal cord injury to her brain.

This was just what the doctor ordered for Trish as the thought that there is real hope for the future is all she needs to keep going strong, and to deal with whatever comes. She is committed to working with the physical therapists each week and including the "stim bike" in her routine to keep the muscles in her legs active, and strong (see the picture from the July 13th post).

Trish & Scott plan to go boating this weekend with one of the therapists from St. Joseph's (who also has a boat).

More Challenges

2007-08-04T06:40:00.000-07:00

Trish finished her second full week at home, and continues to adapt to her new circumstances.

Her recovery efforts continue to be hampered by the nerve pain in her lower extremities. The doctors are struggling to find a medication that will deal with the pain without adverse side effects. Trish will be seeing a pain management specialist next week who has experience with SCI patients.

Scott has arranged for the installation of a stair lift in their home to help Trish get upstairs. This should be installed late next week and will open up a whole new set of challenges and opportunities. When Trish can transport herself up the stairs, she will be able to use the master bathroom and she will be able to sleep in her own bedroom for the first time since May.

She continues with her out-patient PT & OT therapies, and has set a goal to learn how to get from her chair into her car so she can begin driving again. This will take a lot of effort, but will represent a huge milestone in her road to independence.

Nice Weekend

2007-07-30T06:58:00.001-07:00

Trish and Scott spent a nice, but busy, weekend with the boys.

Hunter celebrated his 8th birthday this weekend, so there were parties with various members of Trish & Scott's families.

Trish is getting ready for her second week of out-patient therapy, and looks forward to making more progress on her road to complete independence.

Her struggle continues to be tough, as she still is suffering from a significant amount of pain in her lower extremities. This is very frustrating and does hamper her work on her recovery. The doctors continue to work on this problem.

Trish, Scott and the boys are enjoying the generous support of many in providing their meals. This has helped greatly as Trish transitions back to a more normal life. Thank you all very much.

New Phase Begins

2007-07-25T06:45:00.000-07:00

After four full days at home, Trish began her next phase of therapy yesterday at St. Joseph's Hospital's out-patient neuro rehabilitation facility in Phoenix. Scott reported that the atmosphere there was very positive and that Trish reacted very well to her first day.

Her two therapists expected quite a bit from her and acted more like "you can do that yourself". Both Trish & Scott think that this approach will help her progress more rapidly toward the true independence she seeks. Trish will be going to this therapy twice a week for 2-3 hours each day for as much as six months.

Home at Last

2007-07-20T06:44:00.000-07:00

Trish was released from the hospital yesterday after almost eight weeks of ICU, surgery and neuro rehabilitation. She accumulated quite a bit of stuff in her hospital room, and it was a major project getting everything moved out.

Now that she is home, Trish can begin the real adaptation process of living day to day. She and Scott are still working to make the major home modifications that are required, but they will improvise until they get these things completed.

I understand from Scott's mom that a lot of wonderful folks have offered to help with meals for the family. This will make Trish's transition a little easier, and will be very much appreciated.

Next week Trish begins her out patient therapy, which will be two days per week. She and her mom decided to drive back to St. Joseph's so Trish can take advantage of the SCI specific treatment offered only there. She will maintain this therapy schedule for up to six months so she can complete her transition to full Independence.

More later ...

Help with Meals

2007-07-17T06:28:00.000-07:00

As Trish will be going home later this week, her mother-in-law, Pam Stressman is organizing people who wish to help by providing meals for Trish, Scott & the boys.

If you are interested, please send an email to Pam at pstressman@cox.net to let her know. She will work with you on the details.

Once again, thanks to everyone for the terrific support you have given Trish during this very difficult time.

A Tough Few Days

2007-07-16T18:26:00.000-07:00

Well, not all days are good. Trish had some problems the last few days that made this week high up on the "not so good" list.

To make a long story short, she has been knocked out of her chair by some auto-closing hospital doors, as well as a few other problems. She really just wants to go home.

The rehab gang was scheduled to go bowling tonight, and Trish is very upset that she will miss the outing.

Better day tomorrow ...

Almost Fun

2007-07-13T05:33:00.001-07:00

Here is a shot of Trish riding the "Stim Cycle". This is a device the therapists use to provide some exercise for legs that otherwise get no muscular activity.

Electrodes are attached to the thighs, and a mild shock is sent to the muscles on a timed basis. The result is that the legs move and pedal the bike. This does not work for all patients, but Trish's legs responded beautifully to the stimulus, and she rode for several minutes.

The primary purpose of this treatment is to help Trish keep the muscle tone in her legs and to prevent atrophy. I think there is also a psychological boost just to see your legs move after so much inactivity (even if you are not really the one moving them).

The last few days have been good ones, and Trish continues to prepare for her eventual release from the hospital and the transition into out-patient therapy.

She really does enjoy all the blog comments, cards and notes, and looks forward to reading your messages every day. Thank you for the continuing support.

Another Week of Work

2007-07-11T07:22:00.000-07:00

This will be another week of physical, occupational and recreational therapy for Trish. She continues to hone the physical skills that will help her be more independent when she returns home.

The efforts by the doctors are also continuing to deal with the various accident related internal issues. These continue to frustrate Trish and make the PT work even tougher.

Here she is working with Mellisa, her PT, on making the move from her chair to the bed which has been raised above her. This more advanced transfer skill will be needed for her to "pop-over" from her chair into the chair on the stair lift she and Scott hope to buy. This stair lift, while very expensive and not covered by insurance, will be the key for Trish to live her life both down and upstairs in their new home.

Today Trish will be going out to lunch with the other rehab patients as the RT staff continues to work with the gang to "get out and about" from the hospital.

More later this week ...

Quiet Weekend

2007-07-09T05:49:00.000-07:00

Trish & Scott took advantage of a day pass from the hospital on both Saturday & Sunday to spend some time at home.

On Saturday they had some friends over for dinner and enjoyed some relaxing time together. On Sunday they had the boys and also went over to Trish's mom's for dinner.

These trips home are really nice as Trish can escape the routine of the hospital and gain experience with what life will be like at home very soon.

Today she will be back at the PT & OT routine in earnest as this will most likely be the last full week of in-patient therapy. Trish will be concentrating on regaining her balance skills after removing the chest brace, and also wants to improve her ability to "pop-over" from bed to chair, and chair to bed.

Her doctors continue to work on the proper combination and dosage of medications to fight her nerve pain as well as her muscle spasms. This effort will probably continue after she transitions to the out-patient therapy sessions.

Next Steps

2007-07-07T06:58:00.000-07:00

After reviewing her current condition, Trish's surgeon ordered the TSLO brace removed. This is a full chest, clam shell like brace that Trish wore every time she was sitting up. It was great to get rid of this thing, but she is now presented with a new set of problems.

The purpose of the brace was to provide stability when Trish was upright and protect her spine at the site of her surgery from further injury. She was originally told that she would need this brace for 8-12 weeks. But with only 5+ weeks passed since her surgery, this shows how quickly she has healed. Now that her spinal bones have fused with the screws and metal rods, there is no danger of further injury to her spinal cord.

With the brace gone, Trish must relearn all her balance and transfer skills. Yesterday, she said she felt like a cork bobbing on the ocean when she sits in her wheelchair. This feeling of instability was very unsettling, but should go away after additional physical therapy to help her regain her balance.

Trish and Scott are now making plans in earnest for Trish's return home. If all continues to go well, she may be released from the hospital in two weeks or less. After release, she will continue her PT & OT sessions on an out-patient basis for several months. She will be traveling back to St. Joseph's from her home in Queen Creek two days per week.

Working Hard

2007-07-04T06:36:00.000-07:00

Here is a shot of Trish and Max, one of the other patients that was admitted shortly after Memorial Day weekend.

They are both working on improving their upper body strength, which is critical to their level of independence. Once released from the hospital they will both need the extra strength to get around.

Trish is working extra hard with additional sessions each day so she will be able to both get around in her house more easily, and also transfer herself into her car sooner rather than later. As you know, Trish does not like to sit around very much, so getting into the car by herself will be a really big step.

Parker & Hunter came to visit again yesterday afternoon and shared mom's therapy session in the hospital's pool. Not a bad place to be on a 115 degree day. Today, Trish & Scott hope to go to a movie together with several of the other rehab patients.

And since this is the 4th of July, they all plan on rolling out into the parking garage tonight and taking the elevator to the roof. From that vantage point, they will be able to see 2-3 of the downtown fireworks displays up close and personal.

Making Plans

2007-07-03T07:36:00.000-07:00

On Monday, Trish, her mom and I were able to visit the out patient rehabilitation center at Barrows Neurological Institute. It is right down the street from the hospital and is a very comprehensive facility.

We were given the tour by the therapist that would work with Trish if she chooses to go there when she leaves the hospital in 3-4 weeks. The main attraction of this facility over the ones available in the east valley is the staff of therapists. They are the only ones that are specialists in spinal cord injury (SCI) rehab. While several of the other rehab centers have therapists that work with neuro rehab, they are really generalists.

Trish, Scott & her mom will make the decision on which center to attend based on the quality of the services, and the travel time required. Once released from the hospital, Trish will need to continue her therapy as an out patient 2-3 days per week for several months. Each session will be anywhere from 1-3 hours in length and will continue her program of strength training as well as occupational skill building (living life).

More later this week ...

Another Up & Down Week

2007-06-30T07:45:00.000-07:00

Trish continues to make progress with her therapy each day, and was able to go swimming again on Thursday. This time Parker & Hunter were able to join her and the therapist recruited them to help Trish with her exercises in the pool. They were real troopers and took to the task like professionals.

The downside of each passing week is Trish's realization that she may never again have the use of her abdomen and her legs. The thought of living the rest of her life like this is depressing for her, but luckily, she only gets down occasionally. Most of the time she continues to have a great attitude and is willing to continue her fight to get better.

This week Trish was able to "pop over" between her wheelchair and the therapy bed in the spinal cord gym. This means she did her own transfer without the need of a slide board and represents one more great step toward her Independence.

Trish continues to receive greeting cards and comments here on the blog, and very much enjoys reading each and every one. Thank you so much for all the continued support ...

Working Out

2007-06-28T07:11:00.001-07:00

This is an old picture from two weeks ago (when Trish was still wearing the neck brace). She is with Jason, her Occupational Therapist, who also sees her twice each day. As you can see, Jason is helping Trish improve her upper body strength so she can better handle all her daily tasks.

It is really amazing the strength that is required to do every day things when you have no help from your abdominal muscles or your legs. But being an athlete really helps, and Trish has taken to her routine with real dedication.

Both Jason and Melissa accompanied Trish & Scott to their home yesterday to evaluate the changes required to improve access. While much of their home will work well, they will need to make two major and rather costly adjustments.

First, they will need to install a stair lift that will allow Trish to move up and down the stairs between the first and second floors. This will be a major investment, but will enable Trish to use the upstairs bedrooms and bath. Next, they will need to remodel their bathroom to provide access to the shower. Trish & Scott hope to use the generous donations they have received toward the cost of these projects.

Again, Trish & Scott both want to thank everyone for their wonderful support through this ordeal.

Therapy is Working

2007-06-26T18:00:00.000-07:00

Here is a shot of Trish with her physical therapist, Melissa, who works with her twice a day. The guy on the right is me, the therapist in training. Scott has worked with Trish so much during her therapy that he is now an expert and can help her do all the exercises. Trish's mom and I are still learning the ropes.

This week Trish was able to sit up from a prone position all on her own. This is a real milestone as it is the first move required to get out of bed and get into her chair. Her upper body strength is improving each day and this is helping her greatly.

Trish remains frustrated, however, as she continues to experience strange feelings in her abdomen and legs. Even though she cannot move her legs, they continue to spasm and jump occationally. She sometimes feels like she is standing in a snow bank and her legs and feet are freezing. Other times her feet feel like they are wrapped tightly in tape.

While having these sensations might be considered as good, if they do not contribute to any movement, they are just frustrating and uncomfortable for Trish. She is also experiencing muscle spasms in her chest that knock the wind out of her.

But, all in all, things contnue to get better each day. This past weekend Trish, Scott and the boys went to see "Fantastic 4" and she got her first theater experience in her wheelchair. And this week the therapists are planning several "out of hospital" activities.

More later this week ...

Nice Weekend

2007-06-25T06:53:00.000-07:00

Trish took advantage of a pass on both Saturday and Sunday to go home for visits during the day. She and Scott spent most of Saturday at home together, and on Sunday they were joined by Parker & Hunter. These visits help Trish begin the process of returning home full time and also help her understand how she will be able to function out of the hospital envirnoment.

This week the Barrows therapists will be visiting Trish & Scott's home in Queen Creek to help with an evaluation of the changes they will need to make. The biggest challenge will be the stairway that leads to the bedrooms and master bath on the second floor. We are looking at companies that sell stair lifts to enable Trish to move between floors with a minimum of assistance.

Now that a month has passed since the accident, Trish continues to heal from her surgery, and she continues to gain confidence in her ability to handle her body. At times she does get down as she contemplates the big changes in her life, but her true spirit always shines through. That beautiful smile is always there and she manages to pull through the rough times.

Trish & Scott very much appreciate all the support they have been given by both family and friends. They are beginning to look at the new medical expenses and home modification costs and they very much appreciate the financial support that has begun to accumulate. Please keep the prayers, messages, cards, and support coming.

More later this week ...

Tough Week

2007-06-23T05:38:00.000-07:00

This has been a very tough week as Trish continues to struggle with nausea and some tiredness. The doctors are still working on the combinations of medications so Trish will feel better, be able to eat more, and more effectively work to regain her strength.

On Wednesday, the therapists took Trish & a group of patients out for lunch for Chinese. Scott was able to meet them and join in with the group. At lunch, the group also met one of the former patients that had been in the Neuro Rehab unit several months ago.

Each week, some of the rehab alumni drop in to visit with the current group and share their stories. Trish particularly enjoyed a visit from Scott Hogsett. Scott is a young man in his late twenties who was injured in his early teens and is now quadriplegic. In many ways, Scott has led a more full life since his accident than before.

With a winning personality and smile, he helped explain to the group that with a display of the right attitude, people see him as a person, and do not even look at his wheelchair. He was able to answer their questions and help them understand that there was really nothing they could not do if they wanted.

Scott shared the intimate details of his personal life and how he faces the struggles of daily life. He also shared his experience as a member of the US Quad Rugby team in the Para-Olympics. His experience, as well as the other members of the team, was showcased in the movie documentary "Murderball" (available on DVD).

Trish really enjoys all the comments and good wishes she receives. Keep the positive thoughts and prayers coming ... she needs them.

More later ...

Getting into the Rehab Routine

2007-06-19T17:12:00.001-07:00

Well, Trish is getting more and more into the routine of her rehabilitation. Each weekday her morning begins at 8:00am and she does not seem to stop for a minute until 3:30pm or so.

She continues to make excellent progress in her therapy sessions, and even though she has not yet seen any change in her paralysis, she continues to develop more and more independence. Late last week she and Scott shared a bitter sweet moment as they ordered her wheelchair. In some ways it was a downer to accept the fact that she may need this long term, but it was also nice to look forward to having a chair designed and fitted perfectly to her needs.

This week Trish has been challenged by some nausea, and has lost her breakfast each day along with all of her medications. We had a meeting with her doctor today, and she is changing the combination of medications to address the nausea, as well as some general tiredness that Trish is experiencing. Trish really does not like to take any medications, and looks forward to the time when her body fully adjusts to her new situation.

One of her new activities is swimming. Under the close supervision of a recreational therapist, Trish spent an hour in the pool on Monday. It felt really good to get in the water, and with the aide of some ankle weights, to actually stand for the first time since the accident. Being upright is such a natural thing for us, Trish has missed this the most. She managed to swim the back stroke for four laps, as well as perform a log roll where she used her arms to right herself after the therapist turned her face down in the water. Much of this was designed to help her build confidence that she could be in the water without fear of drowning.

Scott has returned to work full time this week (they had to drag him kicking & screaming), so Trish has had more time on her own. This is tough on Trish, but may be even harder on Scott. He really has not left her side since the accident and has provided incredible support toward her recovery.

Well, I had better stop for now ... more later this week.

A Visit Home

2007-06-17T06:49:00.000-07:00

Yesterday, Trish was able to get out of the hospital for a few hours and visit her home. Scott took responsibility to help her transfer from her chair into her car for the trip to Queen Creek.

Once at home, Trish enjoyed a visit with Scott, Parker & Hunter, the two dogs and the cat. She said it sure felt good to be in their wonderful new home again.

After some games, some swimming (Parker & Hunter), a BBQ in the back yard courtesy of chef Scott, they headed back to the hospital late in the evening.

Now that Trish no longer has to wear the neck brace, she is looking forward to a very productive week of PT & OT sessions.

Another Step Forward

2007-06-15T18:23:00.000-07:00

After a visit from her surgeon, Dr. Nick Theodore, Trish was told that she would no longer need to wear a cervical collar neck brace.

A collar was applied by the Mexican paramedics a half hour after her accident and she has worn one for almost three weeks. When she was admitted to the St. Joseph's trauma center, they thought they detected a hairline fracture at the base of her skull. So the collar was necessary to prevent potential further injury.

But, after further examination, it did not appear to be a problem, so she was able to take it off. Other than a little weakness in her neck, and a little nausea when she moves her head around, she is now free to look sideways, up and down.

The collar had added greatly to her discomfort, and impeded a lot of movement during her PT sessions. Once her neck is strong again, she will be much better able to handle the movements they are teaching her.

So, one small step at a time towards mobility and a normal life ...

Trish Continues Rehab

2007-06-14T05:03:00.000-07:00

Each day brings a new challenge as Trish continues her rehabilitation. The PT & OT staff introduce something new almost every day to push her to new heights of independence. I had the privildge of helping with her therapy on Tuesday, and very much enjoyed the experience.

Early this week she was introduced to the new ways she will need to approach her work in the kitchen preparing meals for Scott & the boys. After a few small adjustments in her new home's kitchen, she will be able to handle this just like before the accident.

Later this week she will also begin to learn car transfers and take on the challenge of getting from her chair into the passenger seat of her Honda Pilot and back again. Once this is accomplished, Trish will be eligible for a field trip where she can leave the hospital for a visit home with Scott, Parker, Hunter and her pets.

During the past week or so Trish has endured some really tough times, but continues to have a positive attitude as she still manages to flash that beautiful smile. She really is an amazing woman.

Her very proud father ...

Trish Says Thank You

2007-06-12T13:55:00.000-07:00

Trish wants you to understand that she loves getting your messages, comments, emails, cards, etc. But, due to her very busy rehab schedule and her need for required rest, she does not have time to respond. Please know that she very much appreciates all you do, and worries that she has not had time to answer.

Please take this as a huge "Thank You" for everything you have done. Every time we see Trish read these cards/messages and receive gifts, flowers, etc. we see a great big smile and we know how much they mean to her. Most of all, she feels very blessed with all the people that are thinking of her and praying for her.

Hospital Mailing Address

2007-06-12T04:04:00.001-07:00

Hello all ...

Several people have asked for Trish's mailing address so they could send cards ... here it is:

Mrs. Trish Stressman
Neuro Rehab - Room 2R31W
St. Joseph's Hospital
350 West Thomas Road
Phoenix, Arizona 85013

Trish certainly enjoys hearing from everyone, and very much appreciates all the wonderful words of encouragement.

More soon ...

A Quiet Weekend

2007-06-11T08:10:00.000-07:00

Trish & Scott had a fairly quiet weekend in St. Joseph's Neuro Rehabilitiation Center.

On Saturday only one PT session was scheduled and Sunday was a day of rest. So they had a chance to get caught up on some visits with family & friends, as well as spend a little more time together.

Today, Trish starts her routine all over again with a full week of rehab exercises. She told me that she was going to have a field trip this week where the rehab staff takes a group of patients out of the hospital for a visit to a local attraction. This will be Trish's first time out of St. Jospeh's since the accident over two weeks ago.

More later ...

A Day of Mixed Blessings

2007-06-09T04:44:00.000-07:00

Well, yesterday was certainly a mixed bag of events for Trish. Every day is different, and presents its own set of challenges.

During her morning rehabilitation session she was working with the therapist when the muscles in her upper back seized and knotted. This was very, very painful and forced Trish to stop the therapy. The staff applied heat, and massaged her back until the muscles began to relax. By noon she had relief on one side, but the other side was still in spasm. Within another hour, both sides had relaxed and she had some relief from the pain.

Trish was determined, however, to return to her afternoon therapy. Once she got into the routine again, she started to make some terrific progress. By the end of the session she was playing volleyball while sitting up, bumping and setting the ball as it was thrown to her.

This was such a natural athletic activity for Trish that she was able to balance herself without really thinking about how to do it. This experience was a glimmer of the good things to come as she showed herself that she will recover her abilities, even if she has to do them sitting down.

More soon ... Trish's proud father.

Visitation Rules

2007-06-07T06:33:00.000-07:00

Trish & Scott have asked me to post some rules for visitation while she is in the rehab center.

Her schedule each day is very full with both physical and occupational therapy sessions, and each of these sessions really takes a lot out of her. So there are definately periods of time during the day when she needs to rest.

Here are the rules ...

No visits before 4:00pm each day
Before you visit, please call ahead to make sure Trish is having a good day and is up to seeing you. Please call 480-242-2590
Please keep your visits short ... approximately 15 minutes
Please consider sending a card or an email rather than visiting

Trish very much appreciates all the wonderful support she has received, and feels bad she has not had time to write thank you notes to all those who have sent flowers, etc.

Trish's Therapy Progresses

2007-06-07T06:25:00.000-07:00

Now that Trish is into her first full week of physical & occupational therapy, the staff at the Barrows Neuro Rehabilitation Center has been able to fully evaluate her condition and her progress.

They have told Trish that she should expect approximately six weeks in the center before she can go home, and then to continue therapy sessions as an out patient. This is really good news and shows how hard she is working at each session. Trish remains determined to recover her full independence.

She still has a way to go, but the outlook continues to be bright with small amounts of progress each day. Scott is there with her every single minute, and has been a rock of support. With his help, there is nothing that Trish will not be able to accomplish.

Trish's Rehabilitation Schedule

2007-06-02T06:44:00.000-07:00

On Friday the 1st Trish completed her first full day in the rehabilitation center. Most of the activities were focued on evaluating her physical and mental condition.

The staff told her that she was only the second person they had admitted so soon after surgery. They felt that this was due to her excellent physical condition, her physical & mental strength, and the relative ease with which her body handled the spinal surgery.

Her daily schedule is fairly well packed with OT & PT sessions. She starts the day at 8:00am getting dressed and moving from the bed to a wheelchair. She then is responsible to move herself to the spinal cord gym for her sessions. The staff really does believe in helping her become indepentent very quickly. In fact there is a rule ... no spouse or family member is allowed to push her in the wheelchair.

Due to this busy schedule Trish & Scott have asked that her friends limit their visits to the late afternoon after 4:00pm. This will enable her to concentrate on her therapy as well as get the needed rest periods after each session. Trish really does enjoy your visits and wonderful support.

Her room is now filled to the brim with the many beautiful flower arrangements that have been sent. In fact, Trish & Scott would ask that no more flowers be sent. If you wish to show further support, please consider a donation to the account at National Bank of Arizona (see details in an earlier post or contact Kristi Sheahan).

I will attempt to update this site every few days with news on Trish's progress. Thanks again for all the love, prayers and support everyone has given.

Trish moves into Rehabilitation Center

2007-06-01T07:34:00.000-07:00

Late Thursday afternoon the 31st Trish was moved into her new room in the Barrows Neuro Rehabilitation Center. This facility is directly connected to St. Joseph's hospital and is located just south of the 3rd Avenue parking garage. The facility is on the 2nd floor of the 240 building and allows regular visiting hours.

Trish is sharing a room with another spinal cord injury (SCI) patient. Her roommate also suffered a spine injury in an accident and is currently 6 months pregnant. All the patient rooms in this facility are doubles. The Neuro Rehab Center is less than six months old and is a world class facility.

Trish's schedule in rehab will be quite busy. She will be in various physical therapy sessions from 3-4 hours each day (Monday through Saturday) and will be working on her recovery in both the morning and afternoon. I will share more details regarding the specific times as we become more familiar with the program so you can plan your visits.

Trish remains positive and is 100% committed to do whatever it takes to regain the function of her legs. While she is experiencing quite a bit of pain, she has tackled her early PT sessions with excellent effort. There is nothing they have asked of her that she has been unable to accomplish.

Once again, thank you for all the love, support, and prayer ... keep it all coming.

Scott's Arm is OK

2007-06-01T07:22:00.000-07:00

On Tuesday, May 29th Scott was able to see an orthopedic surgeon to evaluate the injury to his left elbow. We took the X-Ray films that were taken in the emergency room at St. Joseph's Hospital the night they arrived.

After a detailed inspection of both the films and Scott's arm, Dr. Alan Rothbart told us there were no fractures, and no apparent ligament or tendon damage.

After he provided Scott with a prescription for an anti-inflammatory medication and showed him some exercises to help in the healing we returned to Trish's hospital. Scott will have a return visit in two weeks to evaluate his progress.

We are all pleased that Scott's injury will heal quickly, as he will need all his strength for the challenges ahead.

Account Created for Donations

2007-06-01T07:17:00.000-07:00

Our families would like to express our sincere gratitude to everyone for all of your prayers and support this week. Trish was moved out of ICU into a recovery room yesterday, and will hopefully be moved to the Rehabilitation Center at St. Joseph's Hospital tomorrow.

She has had two therapy sessions so far and was able to sit in a chair for about 3 hours today. She gained about 2 -3 inches of feeling in her chest yesterday, which was a positive sign. They are still telling us that everything is day to day so we continue to pray for every milestone that is reached.

We thank everyone for their offers of help and support. We are trying to organize everything and will hopefully be utilizing you all soon.

There has been an account set up to assist Scott and Trish with the medical bills and expenses that are to come. Donations can be made at a National Bank of Arizona to Acct. #0568005203. Please contact Kristi Sheahan if you have any questions.

We ask that you continue to keep the family in your prayers for all the obstacles ahead.

Trish & Scott have ATV accident

2007-06-01T07:12:00.000-07:00

This memorial day weekend Trish & Scott traveled into Mexico with several friends. They planned a long weekend an hour south of Yuma on the Baja bay. Their friends have a home very near the beach and they planned a weekend of fun including some ATV riding, sun bathing and swimming in the ocean.

On Saturday afternoon, Trish and Scott we riding double on his ATV (which they have done many times before) along the beach. As they were riding along, they approached an unexpected steep berm, and despite Scott's best efforts to slow down, they hit the berm and were launched into the air. The ATV came down on its nose and they were both thrown over the handle bars. Trish apparently landed on her head and seriously injured her back. She was unconscious between 1-5 minutes and when she awoke she had no sensation in her legs and could not move.

An ambulance was called and arrived 20-30 minutes later. The Mexican paramedics stabilized her on a back board, applied a cervical collar and started an IV. They then transported her into town to a clinic. After a lengthy delay, which included Scott's arrest for being involved in a vehicle accident, the authorities agreed to transfer Trish across the border to the hospital in Yuma, Arizona.

After further treatment in Yuma, Trish & Scott were transported via helicopter to St. Joseph's hospital and the Barrow's Neurological Unit in Phoenix. They were met in the trauma room by all Trish & Scott's parents and Scott's sister. Once at Barrows the neurologists were able to evaluate her injury more completely.

We were then told that Trish had suffered a fracture of her spine between the T5 & T6 vertebrae. She had also suffered a spinal cord injury that was causing the paralysis. The entire spinal cord team at Barrows was consulted in the middle of the night and surgery was scheduled for Sunday morning to fuse the fracture in her spine.

Scott had suffered a potential broken elbow on his left arm, and while the x-rays were not conclusive the doctors splinted his arm and put it in a sling. He will need to consult an orthopedic surgeon next week for further evaluation.

On Sunday morning we waited in the ICU for Trish's surgery to begin. At one point I counted 14 people in the waiting room ... all there for Trish. The minister from her church showed up late in the morning with a prayer shawl that had been blessed by the entire congregation at that morning's service. Several friends and every single member of her extended family have been visiting and praying.

About 10:00am Trish was taken into pre-op and made ready for the surgery. We waited almost 2 1/2 hours until the surgeon came out to tell us how everything went. He said that he had installed several screws and rods to stabilize her broken spine. He then told us that while there was a severe bruise to the spinal cord, it had not been severed in the accident. Without giving us any unrealistic hopes, he said that there was a chance Trish would begin to recover some feeling and movement in her legs. At the moment she is paralyzed from the chest down.

As she came out of surgery (and they wheeled her past the waiting room) she wanted to stop and say "hi" to every single one of her family and friends. She said that she is ready to start therapy and will do whatever it takes to recover. She has a terrific spirit and is a real fighter.I am going to wrap this post up for now, even though I know I have left out some critical points. I will use this writing as therapy for myself and also to help fill the time in the waiting room.

More soon ... keep the prayers coming.

Welcome to Trish's Place

2007-06-01T06:59:00.000-07:00

Hello all ... welcome to the new blog space created for Trish Stressman.

Please come back often to keep up to date with new posts, and don't forget to leave a comment or two for Trish. I will make sure she gets to read every message.

And again, thanks for all the love, prayers and support she has been given.

Richard Sauerbrun ... Trish's proud father.