acknowledgement for the unacknowledged

This morning was a bright crisp autumn morning as I walked Ben to the bus stop.  On my journey home, I noticed a possibly homeless man I have seen quite often in our neighborhood.  His pants have only one leg that reaches to the ground, the other cut off at the knee, and he wears a tattered hat.  Sometimes when he walks down the street it seems as if his brain gets stuck on doing one activity obsessively.  I have wondered how imprisoning that must feel to have your brain be stuck, forcing your body to repeat an action over and over.  This morning as I walked by, he seemed in a better state of mind, I said, "Good morning," as we do here in Madison.  He responded in kind and then said, "Thank You."  What struck me was the thank you, it was as if he was not used to someone greeting him and he truly felt appreciative for the acknowledgment.  Made me feel both happy to be a part of that moment and sad that this did not seem more of the norm for him. 

On Saturday night, Ellie pretty much passed out at 7pm.  She continued to sleep on into the day on Sunday.  This is not completely abnormal for her, particularly since she had pulled an all nighter last week.  Around 3pm on Sunday we decided to make sure that we could still wake her up.  During her sleep she had started moaning and crying.  We were unable to arouse her fully.  Thom and I debated whether or not to try to get her to our car on our own or to call 911.  Ben's enthusiastic vote was to "call 911!  Call 911!!!"  For the safety of Ellie, making sure we didn't cause her any further injury, we decided to call 911.  I sort of wish there was an 811--this is an emergency but not a total emergency.  We really just need a ride to the ER, and of course the prompt service we get when we arrive by ambulance is also an incentive.  Upon arrival, Ellie was given, as usual, a stress dose of steroids.  Typically this revives her.  Yesterday it was a no go.  The only thing that seemed amiss was that her sodium was low.  Ellie is still not fully awake this morning, she does moan and cry out when someone is "bugging her"--as she is right now because she is getting another EEG to rule out seizure activity.  She has not opened her eyes and spoken since Saturday.  Her MRI and shunt tap showed that the shunt is still functioning well and there is no sign of infection in her brain.  Dr. Iskandar (neurosurgeon extraordinaire) stopped by to say that she is just extremely sensitive to even seemingly small changes right now.  He said that we could expect at the very least a year of her being more vulnerable.  The EEG technician was just taking off the glue and Ellie yelled out, "OUCH!" as she had her hair combed and she even opened one eye.  Never have I been so excited to hear an "ouch" before. 

Last night, our great neighbor, Chris stopped by with her order for a school fundraiser.  She asked if she could get us anything from our local grocery store.  I said no, right as Ben said, "Moldy bread, clean water, and bananas."  So about an hour later, Chris stopped back by with a bunch of bananas.  So sweet.  Brittany also stopped by and helped me fold some of the mountains of laundry that have accumulated over the last 24 hours.  Thanks to both of these fantastic women!