Andy’s appointment on Thursday at Duke went well.  They took more x-rays and the doctor gave Andy the go ahead to take off the air cast he had been wearing since the foot was healing up.  And this also meant that the doctor said it was ok for Andy to start driving again!  We were both really excited about this since it means that Andy will be able to start going in to work again soon.  The doctor also talked to us a little about Andy’s hip and said that it was healing as expected and we’d still have to wait and see…but things are looking good.  Andy will be walking with a cane and doing more PT for 6 more weeks at least.  So it was a good visit and I drove part of the way home and then Andy drove a little bit too down a familiar straight road.  He drove around a little more on Friday to get used to things again and said that it felt good.  He had been working with the PT a lot on moving his ankle and putting more pressure on it, which he said had been helping him to feel comfortable with being able to accelerate and brake and all.

This weekend the big storm hit North Carolina…but we were lucky enough to be south of most of the snow.  We only got an inch or so and some ice.  Things are still pretty shut down around here since people are nervous to drive with the ice and church was cancelled.  So we spent the weekend inside and I got caught up on a lot of cleaning/organizing that I had been needing to get to for a while.  Andy did venture outside and cleared off the cars a little bit for us.  He was out there before I realized it and navigated the ice ok.  It was nice of him to make sure the car was cleaned off for me since I’ll be heading to work tomorrow and hate the snow!  He was supposed to be trying to head into work tomorrow too, but his boss already called and told him not to worry about trying to drive in for the first time with the ice.  Here’s a picture I got of Andy when I realized he was outside:

Hope everyone had a good weekend!

As we took down our Christmas tree this weekend, (I know, I know, we should’ve done it last weekend, I just got busy with laundry and other things and never got around to it….Andy decided to help me get going with it last week when he wanted to light a fire and moved the tree and decorations away from the fireplace in a big, messy, pile….thus forcing me to finally get it over with this weekend) I wondered why I had even bothered with the tree and decorations this year.  We weren’t even at our place for Christmas, didn’t fill our stockings, and Andy could care less whether we decorated or not.  And it was a huge bother for me to do it alone….lug the tree out of storage, set it up, decorate it alone, and all….but it helped me somehow to feel like it was more normal I think.  I set it up the weekend after Thanksgiving while I was home alone and Andy was up at his Dad’s.  His accident and injuries were all still pretty recent and scary and we didn’t know what was going on day to day with him.  I pulled it out and enjoyed decorating and trying to remind myself that we were thankful to be able to celebrate anything together this year. That was Christmas for us this year.  Not the most fun, and really crazy every step of the way….but thankful to be alive and able to celebrate.

And now, we put them away and see what next year brings….

Don’t worry….it’s not that bad.

I just woke up this morning with really bad eye pain and my eye swollen shut.  I remembered that I had a hard time the previous evening getting one of my contacts out. After a long time trying to get it out and not seeing it anywhere in my eye, I gave up and hoped that it had fallen out and my eye was just irritated from my trying to get a contact lens out for a little while.  Apparently the contact was still in and/or something was wrong with my eye still this morning.  I called in late to work and went to my eye doctor.  He looked at my eye and found my contact still in it, but it was in several pieces.  I have no idea how that contact managed to tear apart, but somehow it did.  Anyways, I’m fine – just have to use antibiotic drops for a few days.  Just a pain.  Sorry if this was a little TMI for non-contact lens wearers.

The good news is much more exciting….

It was a good thing I stayed home a little this morning (due to the above mentioned eye junk) because I got to be here for Andy’s PT session.  His therapist came in and started talking to us about getting Andy started with out patient physical therapy sometime soon.  We talked a little about everything and got the recommendations of out patient clinics for him.  Then the PT had Andy doing some exercises and walking around and he turns to me and says “Abi, can you see about getting an appointment for Andy to do out patient this week?”  The PT was surprised at how much Andy had improved in the past few days and how much weight-bearing he is able to do now.  He thinks that he really can’t do much more with Andy at home and he needs to get on machines and do weights and all.  Which is great news!  It’s going to be interesting to see how we work out juggling several therapy sessions a week with my working full-time and him still not being able to drive…but we’ll figure it out.  Thankfully our town is pretty small and everything is really close, so I’m thinking it will be ok.  And Andy’s already talking to the therapists and doctors – bugging them about when they will clear him to drive.  He says its so he go back to work and stop making me drive him everywhere.  I think he just really wants to drive his new car.