Odds, Ends, Blips

This is a smattering of stories, etc with no uniting theme, but offer insight into what’s going on in Gabe’s life now.

Most important for our bicycle comrades, Gabe IS receiving daily Tour de France coverage on the television network Versus, channel 63 at Brewer Rehab. I got back from my bike trip to Nova Scotia expecting a whole lot of loving, but we ended up watching the Tour for two hours instead. True womance. Yesterday we watched on and off between therapies and during meals—he’s quick to unmute after the commercial breaks.

The last weekend in June, one of our friends, Zach, invited us to a bowling birthday bonanza, formal attire kindly requested. Gabe and I dedicated the evening prior to baking chocolate cayenne cupcakes. I set up all the ingredients, then he dumped them in and mixed altogether; I put and removed from the oven, and he mixed and applied the icing.

Bakin’ cupcakes for Zach

The next night was the bowl. He opted to sit and enjoy vs. bowl, drinking in the crowd, the music, and the bowling balls rolling down the lanes (or gutters). One of his first journeys out of Brewer Rehab was to the nearby dollar store, which he found overwhelming–how can a dollar store NOT be overwhelming and completely distracting? The lights, color, music, people, and product fits together on a grid of aisles and shelves that’s a perceptual challenge for his brain scramble. But he was clear on the fact that he enjoyed this experience, and wanted to get used to public environments again. From that time to the bowling party, he’s finding greater focus and less struggle in perceiving everything at once. He needs supervision and assistance navigating, but nevertheless he’s making a step forward.

Sitting, enjoying the bowling party / Evidence he’s retained his sense of humor

Also at the end of June, Gabe and I had a pre-birthday birthday celebration prior to my Nova Scotia trip. We put on fine duds and attended a One-Act play, Under the Big, Blue Tarp, at the Penobscot Theatre in downtown Bangor. A comedy, it lasted 70 minutes and his newly audible laugh—a staccato mmm—echoed to my left more than a few times. The next play was a drama so we beat it onto Main, passing through the Gay Pride Festival to ice ourselves out on iced coffee at our coffeehouse of choice, Giacomo’s (“Jah-cah-moes,” Gabe says for each time I slip with “guaca-mole”).

In the Penobscot Theatre before the show / Passing through Gay Pride Fest

We cruised on foot & wheel up to the little street where Summer and her man Larry reside; Allison, G’s best college chum, and I also live in surrounding apartments. All three pads are upstairs or downstairs, so we were content to sit beside the basil and hops. Summer showered G with chocolate-covered strawberries and pretzels she had just made. The two of us took off to a womance-filled dinner at Fiddlehead, an illustrious dining experience.

Sampling Summer’s chocolate-covered pretzels and strawberries

Sipping bellinis in the window of Fiddlehead

4th of July weekend, our good friend from NYC, Andras, zoomed north on his motorcycle. He spent two days hanging out, to which Gabe recounted happily to me by phone. I could literally hear him smiling. That same weekend, a holiday BBQ at Summer’s went down, complete with bocce. The maple leaf hats are handcrafted by Brie. I wasn’t there for this, but did talk with Gabe the next day from a payphone in Baddeck, Nova Scotia. He sang from memory “The Star-Spangled Banner,” recalling 90% of the words—even I don’t know that much.

Andras visits

The Maple King / Wild action shot of bocce

Under Donna’s guidance, he’s been cranking out real, handwritten letters as of late. Writing is an activity she attacked as early as October and November. It started as an exercise just to get the pen tip to touch paper, cluing us into the depth of field issues he experienced at the time. When that was mastered, she began with his name. While that was the one word we could read, the remainder of his letters was small, cramped, and indistinguishable as shapes. As time proceeded, his words became easier to read. By late winter, he began signing cards, whispering the special messages he wanted written inside. Looking at the product of his writing exercises, we joked that his handwriting was as bad as it was before the bike crash. Since arriving in Maine this May, Donna’s picked up pencils, pens, crayons, colored pencils—all of varying thickness—to use on printing paper, lined paper, graph paper, and children’s writing pads. What’s yielded the best results I’m not sure—you have to ask her! But what you can see overall is an undeniable return to his former, legible handwriting, albeit oversized. She’s given him as much practice as possible, and now he’s writing his own full-blown messages in birthday cards, Father’s Day cards, and thank-you cards.

Writing sample: June 2010 vs. February 2009 (bottom right)

Two weeks ago, Gabe received a Botox treatment in his left arm, and lower calves to release excess tone. Recap: constantly firing neurons create high amounts of tone present in certain muscles, causing them to work 24/7. We referred to this earlier as spasticity, which is an aggregate amount of tone, however his spasticity is so mild now that we hear it now referred to simply as tone. Still, it’s enough to keep his left arm from fully extending, thus the Botox treatment to freeze the muscles and allow the triceps to kick in vs. the ever-active bicep. After the 10-14 day period to hit its peak, he’s moving that left arm and the left leg a bit more easily. And you thought Botox was just for erasing wrinkles.

Myes.

We’ve some good events planned for the summer, to include some fishing at a handicap-accessible pond in the area, a trip to Bar Harbor, and a couple of weddings. He’s recently had some practice getting in and out of Donna’s minivan, so with a little bit more perfected sitting balance and magically attaining a non-power wheelchair, he can try to manually push himself around and we’ll be able to ditch the Fajita van on some outings (the Fajita van is actually really wonderful, except Gabe sits so high that he can’t see out the windows! Also, unable to sit in front passenger seat since one has to climb up into it).

I bring up the following because it’s a fact he’s quite happy about: Gabe’s hair loss has abated. “What?” you say, to which I respond, “Yes, hair loss.” From late February to end of March, Gabe’s ‘do thinned rapidly from forehead to crown, ear to ear. Donna perceived this quickly and noted it to medical staff, who explained that it could be stress-induced, medication-induced, or just that time for that particular chromosome to set free some hair follicles. Certainly his stress isn’t any less, so we attribute it to a specific medication he was on for six weeks. Since discontinuation, his hair has filled back in completely and it’s cut as short as ever to fight off the summer heat. FYI, his ability to grow a beard never slackened, as evidence by the moustache he sported for three months.

As you can probably guess, what you read here can be watered down from the dramatic and comedic instances that happen. You don’t hear about the play-by-play of insurance calls, medical concerns, rehab ups and downs, uncountable victories, and conversation exchanges because either they weren’t worth writing about at the time, or what was more likely, we were just too sensitive to share them. But I feel like the line between what’s shared and what isn’t has rapidly faded in recent months. Gabe is medically stable and has had a remarkable return to himself mentally, emotionally, as well as his intelligence. If one only has THE TIME and THE PATIENCE to sit, speak, listen, and observe, the pre-accident Gabe is easily picked out from the fumbling of relearning how to speak, to move, to grasp all that is perceptually going on in a room or environment. He’s so alive and ripe with utter Gabeness as ever before.

G-Star & Kierie