A New Tactic

To try to help Ethan with his baths, I got him a set of water crayons. I figure distracting him from me scrubbing his wounds might make the whole experience less distressing! Anytime he realizes that I'm messing with his arm, I say "Ethan, where's the purple crayon? Can you draw over here?" And he immediately looks to his crayon and begins to scribble. Yay! Less crying for Ethan, and less crying for me :)

Hail...

Can you believe this? I'm sure some of you have seen even bigger hail, but this was my first time to see anything bigger than rock salt. It looked like tons and tons of dippin' dots in the street, on the deck, in the yard. Glad the cars were in the garage!

Making Progress

We had our first home visit with an occupational therapist yesterday afternoon, and in that short hour Ethan made fantastic progress! For the past two days, the best David and I have done is gotten Ethan to open his left hand, which until then was permanently clenched even though it was not injured. We thought of all sorts of distractions to allow us to manipulate his hand and his arm, practicing some range of motion exercises. However, Ethan would never do it voluntarily. Until yesterday! Our occupational therapist, Tanya, spent about 20 minutes observing him with me before engaging in some real time play. By the end of the hour long session, Ethan was opening and closing his hand, reaching up to grab things, and VOLUNTARILY using his left arm and hand. Wow... We can't wait to continue the playtime activities that Tanya suggested to get him to use his arm even more. One of them is getting him to push. Here he is pushing his stroller, which makes him extend that left arm.

Meanwhile, every morning I continue my on the job training for my second career as nurse! To be honest, I've really enjoyed washing his wounds and changing his dressings, even though he cries the whole time. Perhaps it's my subconscious way of healing the whole experience for me...

Before the Burn...

The day before Ethan's accident we took a trip to Peoria's Wildlife Prairie State Park to try our luck at seeing some animals "native to the area". David was on Spring Break, and the day was forecast to be mild. Though we didn't see too many animals, we had a lovely day strolling in the not-so-mild weather. It was quite brisk :) But I was pleased to find that since last summer Ethan has improved his climbing skills! He was able to climb all the way up this wooden jungle gym and slide.

We rented a little wagon for the trails, thinking that Ethan would get tired and want a ride. Boy, were we wrong! Mommy was the one who got tired! And it was only until I got in the wagon that Ethan wanted to ride, too. So, Dad pulled us along a stretch of trail...

After our trip, we stopped by the local Pizza Hut for lunch. It's probably Ethan's favorite food--pizza! Mom and Dad like it, too...

I love happy, family times, don't you?

Transitioning back

It's been a good day and a half back at home. Yesterday was a bit rough with Ethan being overtired from bad sleep and late naptime. But today, was a ton better. He slept for a good 12 hours, with a few wake ups during the night, but nothing out of the ordinary. This morning we gave him his bath and treated his burns and all went well. Of course, it was uncomfortable for him, but we already knew that. We've also got visits from a home health care nurse to look at his wounds and help with the dressing changes if needed, and an occupational therapist to help Ethan with using his burnt arm.

We will be going back to Springfield once a week over the next 3 weeks to have outpatient services, and eventually have a final look from the doctor at the burn unit. We're not looking forward to these trips, but we are glad that Ethan will get the care he needs.

Below is our last morning at the hospital. We also have pics from his bath from two days ago. The intern that morning took these photos and printed us some copies. As you can see, it still looks pretty bad, but these pictures actually show that he's doing well. You can also see some of the whiter areas near his elbow and upper arm/shoulder that were more severely burned. Anything that is "pink" (like on his trunk) is healthy skin.

We're going home!

This morning at 8am the doctor took a look at Ethan's wounds and she determined that he will heal well on his own. While those problem areas are still more damaged (2nd degree deep partial burns, I think she called them) they will heal on their own, and will indeed have some scars. She explained in depth what kind of scarring might POSSIBLY happen--a raised, rough kind of scar. However, there are ways to help with this, and if in the future we wanted to skin graft we could. Skin grafting right now was still an option, but the healing time for either option would be the same. And a skin graft would still result in scars, just a different kind.

So, tomorrow we will observe the nurses wash and dress his wounds and receive "training". Then we'll all head home in the afternoon. We're not sure what it will be like taking care of him at home, especially with 3 weeks of dressing changes, which is the projected healing time. But we are convinced that God will provide what we need as He has proven to be faithful once again throughout this ordeal.

Thank you for all your prayers. We have felt them in a big way...

A turn for the better

After completing the night shift, David said both of them had a ROUGH night. Ethan slept from midnight to 3, was up until 4, then slept again until 8:30. Not enough sleep for either of them. And when I arrived this morning at 9am, Ethan was still in bed, rather cranky. We quickly got him breakfast and pain meds, since we knew the bath and dressing change was coming up soon.
After the bath, Ethan was quite put out, plus the tylenol/codeine kicked in. He took a long nap while our friend, Rita, came to visit.

We have a new nurse working with us today, and she said that the problem spots still look white. Unfortunately, the doctor didn't make it in to look at him, so we'll have to wait till tomorrow to see what she says.

After Ethan woke up from his nap, we had a good lunch. He even begun to play. Here we are finishing up our meal. He actually counted "1, 2, 3, cheese" for the pic! But we've been very blessed today with another gift: a playmate!

This afternoon as Ethan was beginning to play on his own, a mom and her 23 month old son named Marco were walking by. They had been admitted last night for a similar injury, but the hot water was in a bath tub. The boys were immediately interested in each other, and got to walking around the hallways with moms beside them. This little guy has burn wounds on his feet and bottom, but he was walking all the same!

Not only did the two of them walk/run the halls, they enjoyed a wagon ride. Marco rode, and Ethan pulled! The nurses were so amused and thought it was the cutest thing. I was so happy to see Ethan acting like his old self again.

So while we still don't have a definitive answer, we are filled with hope. Thank you for all your encouraging emails and prayers. We've even had a handful of visitors, some whom I didn't even know. These were women who attended the Hearts at Home conference and had heard our situation during the Mom's Night Out event on Friday night. These people took the time out of their schedule to visit with us and pray with us. Wow...I am continually touched and overwhelmed by my brothers and sisters in Christ.

How quickly things change

On a lovely, sunny and mild day just a week before the start of Spring, we had an unfortunate accident. As I was cooking dinner, Ethan came up beside and me, reached and pulled down a pitcher of hot tea I was brewing on the counter. We quickly went to the ER, but were then transferred via ambulance to the Burn Center at Springfield's Memorial Medical Center.

Upon arrival, the staff determined that he had 2nd degree burns on 13% of his total body surface area. It's a good amount for a little guy, and he was in a lot of pain. They continued the morphine that the ER had begun to administer, which calmed him down quite a bit.

He was delirious, and slept fitfully. David and I, though technically not BOTH allowed to be in his room overnight, were there the entire night to make sure he was ok. This was probably one of the worst nights we'd ever had.

The above pictures were taken on Thursday night when it happened. You can see much of his arm, and part of his chest were burned, but I couldn't get a shot of his under arm/side of torso area. That evening they washed the wounds, treated and bandaged him. They don't allow parents into the tub room, and for good reason. I could hear him screaming throughout the whole burn unit.

The next morning, they repeated the same procedure, and they continue to do this everyday, evaulating his wounds with each dressing change. As many of you have read from my emails, most of his wounds will heal on their own, but there are a couple of areas that suffered more extensively, and it is a "wait and see" approach at this point.

Today, Ethan is doing a LOT better. They stopped the morphine on the second day, and he is eating and drinking well, so they've pulled out the IV as well. We have an occupational therapist working with us to make sure Ethan uses his bad arm. In doing so, it'll prevent that skin from stiffening up from not being used. She brought some toys and balls for him, which was fun for a while, but admittedly Ethan does get bored easily!

We are thankful that God has spared Ethan from any more serious injury. We praise Him for his mercy and provision. We have friends with whom we can stay in Springfield, which means David and I can get good sleep while the other is with Ethan. We have friends who are taking care of our home and kitty while we are gone. But most importantly, we have an extended family of brothers and sisters in Christ who are praying for us. And their prayers are being answered everyday. God is good, and He is able!

For you Star Wars Fans

Two months ago, the Peoria Symphony did a concert of popular movie soundtracks. The most popular medley they did was from the original Star Wars, and then Star Wars: Phantom Menace. As a surprise to the concert-goers, we had Star Troopers and even Darth Vadar himself greet the guests coming in. It was really scary to find out that there is a "battalion" here in Central Illinois that actually meets to talk about all things Star Wars, and probably re-enacts popular scenes from the movies, and do such "gigs" as this one. But you know what was even MORE sad? Was that I got totally pumped when they played the original soundtrack theme and had star troopers, Obi-Wan and some villains process down the side aisles onto the stage. I literally had to stifle my urge to yell and cheer. Man, I'm such a geek... The sabers were COOL! At the very end of the concert they did that "Duel" theme with the choral part. Funny thing was, when the choir came in, I was stunned, because I thought, "Wow! That's a really good track!". I turned to a new friend sitting beside me (that's another story) and looked stunned. Then I looked back to the stage, and there was the choir, along with various characters from the movie rising on the stage. They were standing on one of those rising platforms at the front of the stage that is built for such things. So at the very end, the whole group of performers were on stage for a powerful ending. It was SO CORNY, but as a Star Wars fan, it was fun. Rather indulgent of the conductor, I thought, because it was SO not a typical symphony performance. But it's nice to loosen up sometimes, huh?

You know there's something wrong with this world...

...when you attend a benefit and find that beer and wine are free, but juice costs $1. That just ain't right!

A special guest

Earlier in February we had a very special guest stay with us for one night. One of David's students in Beijing, Arnold, was passing through during his whirlwind tour of the United States on his quest for the perfect graduate school. He was traveling to NY, DC, Boston, Chicago, San Francisco, LA, San Diego (and I'm sure I might have missed a city) to visit his prospective schools. In Chicago he took the time to take the 2.5 hour train ride to our small town of Normal, IL to visit his old teacher.

You may or may not remember that David and I taught English in Beijing for 6 weeks in 2005. (http://vicky_snyder.home.insightbb.com/vickyblog-Summer-05.htm) This was one of his students. David had gotten to share his faith with him, and they had many discussions about Christianity that summer that continued over email. So you can imagine how happy we were to hear about some awesome God stories he shared with us. His English was fantastic! He has made so much progress over the past few years, and during his time traveling the States he really picked up a lot. Arnold shared that over the past couple of weeks he had been traveling he had met so many people who helped him along the way. He had made many connections with several Christian student groups on the campuses he visited and felt God's love and provision EVERY step of the way of his travels. This is the closest I've come to seeing the seed we've planted bear fruit. It was awesome!

During his stay, David showed him our town and the university. Here is Arnold's take on his experience. Check out his facebook pics and captions at http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=400&id=348100150&l=b493f&ref=share

Good luck at school, Arnold! And we hope to see you again!