Day 40 - Monday January 23, 2012

This was a day of getting appointments etc.  I have been trying to get a dentist scheduled to come see Bridgett's teeth.  They are hurting her and we need to see exactly what's up at this point.  It appears that the exposed nerve is still covered, but one of the other teeth doesn't look so good.  Also, I have been trying to figure out about getting Bridgett's eye checked.  There appears to be damage to a couple of nerves in the left eye.  So--this is the outcome of these questions--Bridgett has an appointment with the dental clinic in the hospital tomorrow morning.  Also, she has an appointment at the Moran Eye Clinic (next door) on Feb. 1st, with a neuro ophthalmologist.  The button they got to close the trach WAS the correct one, but over the weekend there was another speech therapist there and she just didn't know how to put it on.  Apparently after she couldn't get it on, it is missing and so we didn't have it to try today.  Kristen is awesome and ordered another one STAT, got it in time for speech therapy (it has to be put on by the speech therapists) and got it on for Bridgett.  So, if her oxygen is good today and tonight, they supposedly will remove the trach tomorrow, or at the latest the next day.  Once the trach is out, we can change Bridgett to the soft collar.  We are assuming that the trach site can be covered sufficiently to be OK under the collar.  I guess we will find out!  Then once she has the soft collar on her neck can start getting stronger.  The physical therapist said that her neck will be weak and it will be a process getting it stronger.  So, the sooner we get started on that the better!  Bridgett talked a little more today.  It is a real process getting her to learn to not whisper, apparently!  But, its a little better every day.  Each day she is a little better at every thing she's doing.