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I thought I finally understood how hospitals worked.
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You went to the hospital, then rehab, then home.
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Simple.
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Until the hospital social worker walked into mom's room and said, We think an acute care hospital is the next step.
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I nodded.
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Like I knew exactly what she was talking about.
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Welcome back to the Wicked Daughter.
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If you've never heard of an acute care hospital before, welcome to the club.
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Neither had I.
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And if this is your first episode, welcome.
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You're joining us in the middle of one family's caregiving journey after my mom was hit by a car.
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Don't worry, you'll be able to follow along.
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But when we're done, I hope you'll go back to episode one and hear how the story began.
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Last week we celebrated survival.
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This week, a different kind of work begins.
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An acute care hospital isn't rehab.
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It's still a hospital.
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But it's for patients who aren't ready for a full scale rehab because they still need hospital level medical care.
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Think of it as a bridge between keeping someone alive and helping them get their life back.
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Apparently, hospitals have more levels than Mario Brothers.
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Most people stay there for a month or less.
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When mom was transferred, we had no idea whether she'd be there for a week, two weeks, or longer.
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At that point, I'd stopped trying to predict anything.
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Every time I thought I knew what came next, caregiving had other plans.
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If you've been with me since episode one, you know that's become the story of this journey.
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The only thing we wanted to know was can they take care of her?
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There were nurses around the clock, respiratory therapists, physical therapists, occupational therapists, dietitians, and doctors who rounded every day to manage her care.
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The facility could handle some procedures and urgent medical issues on site, but it wasn't a full service hospital.
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If mom developed another major complication, she'd be transferred back to the hospital.
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Until now, our goal had been survival.
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Now our goal was progress.
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And those are two very different things.
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The
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biggest surprise? We weren't teaching mom how to walk.
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She couldn't.
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Her broken leg meant no weight bearing for at least another month.
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Realistically, probably longer.
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So therapy looked nothing like I'd imagined.
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Instead of taking steps, Mom was learning to move her fingers, lift her arms, close her hands, hold a fork, grip a toothbrush, brush her hair.
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Baby steps without actually taking any.
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That's when I learned something else about caregiving.
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Recovery isn't just medicine.
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It's relearning things most of us do without even thinking.
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And one of the hardest things for mom to relearn was holding a fork.
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It sounds so simple until you watch someone who can't close their hand around one.
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I'd place the fork in her hand and she'd try.
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She'd drop it.
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I'd put it back in her hand.
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She'd squeeze a little harder.
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It would slip again.
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She just couldn't get her fingers to close around it.
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Day after day breakfast lunch.
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The same thing.
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By dinner she was exhausted.
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Sometimes I'd just feed her.
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Not because I wanted to, but because she was so frustrated and so defeated that I knew she didn't have anything left.
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Every time I'd pick up the fork and feed her, I could see it in her face.
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This wasn't about eating.
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It was about losing one more piece of her independence.
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So every day I became her cheerleader.
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Look, you closed your hand a little more today.
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Tomorrow will be easier.
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I never doubted she'd get there.
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I just didn't know how much patience either of us had left before she did.
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Then after a few days, she finally lifted the fork.
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Success!!! Well sort of.
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Instead of her mouth, the fork hit her nose.
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We both laughed.
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And honestly, we needed that laugh.
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It took another two or three tries before the food actually made it where it was supposed to go.
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But that wasn't the point.
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The point was she did it.
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Not perfectly, not gracefully, but independently.
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And that tiny victory felt bigger than anything we'd celebrated in weeks.
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The fork wasn't the only thing we worked on.
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Every day I became part physical therapist, part cheerleader, part motivational speaker for an audience of one.
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Finish your exercises, mom, and I'll massage your shoulders.
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That became our deal.
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Mom loved those neck massages.
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Yes, they helped with the stiffness, but I think they did something even more important.
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They gave her something to look forward to.
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Because when you're bedridden, the days can start to feel very long.
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That's something nobody really prepares you for about being confined to a bed.
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Not just what it does to your body, but what it does to your spirit.
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Imagine needing someone to help you sit up, brush your teeth, wash your hair, help you with toileting, get dressed, even eat.
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You don't lose who you are, but you do lose some of your privacy, some of your dignity, and a lot of your sense of control.
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For someone who'd been active her entire life?
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I know that was a lot harder on mom than the broken leg itself.
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That's why we kept doing those hand exercises.
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We weren't just trying to get her fingers to move.
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We were practicing independence.
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Recovery doesn't begin with the big milestones.
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It begins with the little things that eventually make the big milestones possible.
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I can't say enough good things about this hospital.
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Every morning someone stopped by with tomorrow's menu.
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Breakfast, lunch, dinner, dessert.
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Mom actually had choices.
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And not just one or two.
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Real choices.
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I never thought one of the highlights of her stay would be the hospital food.
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Yet somehow it was.
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I was there three times a day to help feed mom while she rebuilt the strength and coordination in her arms and hands.
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If I happened to be running late, an aid was usually already feeding her.
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And I was grateful because they had ten or fifteen patients depending on the day.
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I had one.
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They couldn't spend five extra minutes waiting while mom struggled
to hold a spoon.
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I could.
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And those five minutes became therapy.
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Every morning I'd stop by the nurse's station.
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Morning.
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By the fourth day, we all knew each other's names.
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One thing I noticed during those few weeks, and this was just my experience.
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I think things got taken care of a little more quickly because the staff knew I'd be back.
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I wasn't there to second guess the staff.
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I was there to be another set of eyes and ears for ma.
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Not because they weren't doing their jobs, they absolutely were.
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The nurses and aides and therapists were wonderful.
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But they were caring for a lot of patients.
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I was caring for one, and I knew what normal looked like for her.
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If I had a question, I'd ask it.
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If something hadn't been followed up on, I'd follow up.
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If I noticed a change, I'd mention it.
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And I think it made a difference.
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Now I know not everyone can be there every day.
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Life just doesn't make that possible.
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But if you can't, see if maybe someone else can stop by a friend, another family member, a neighbor because having someone who knows your loved one, who asked questions, notices the little things that can make all the difference.
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Over those next few weeks, the little victories kept adding up.
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Little by little, every specialist gave us good news Her lungs, her foot, the hematoma, even her oxygen.
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Five liters became three.
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Three became two then one and a half.
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Every time they turned it down, I held my breath.
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Because after everything we'd been through, I still wasn't used to good news.
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Then one afternoon, Mom asked, Do I have to wear the bipap tonight?
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The respiratory therapist smiled.
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Do your breathing exercises today, and we'll see.
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Now that was motivation.
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Mom hated that bipap machine.
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Every deep breath suddenly had a purpose.
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Every breathing exercise brought her one step closer to sleeping without it.
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The next day the respiratory therapist walked into Mom's room.
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Let's try one night without the bipap.
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Mom looked like she'd just won the lottery.
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After weeks of having that machine strapped to her face, the bipap had officially become her least favorite roommate.
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And finally, it was getting kicked out.
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Until then, I'd been measuring progress in breathing exercises, oxygen levels, and therapy sessions.
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I hadn't stopped to notice what everyone else was starting to see.
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Around that time Dave kept saying, She looks so much better.
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Honestly, I thought he was just trying to make us feel better.
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Then Pam said the same thing.
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That's when it hit me.
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Caregivers don't always notice progress because we're living it one step at a time.
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Mom really was getting stronger.
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Not quickly, not dramatically just a little every day.
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She still couldn't stand.
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She still couldn't put weight on her broken leg.
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She hadn't even gotten out of bed yet.
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But she was doing more for herself every day.
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And for the first time, we could see that all those tiny efforts were adding up. I'd believed she'd get there.
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Now everyone else was finally seeing what I'd believed all along.
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We weren't just hoping Mom was finally getting better.
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We could actually see it.
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And after everything we'd been through, that felt pretty incredible.
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Around here, we're calling that a win.
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Until next time, take care of yourself too.
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When your friends say cherish this time, you smile while you're losing your mind.
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Was it the pharmacy line or the rush hour doctor drive?
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So you swallow that glare with a laugh and a sigh and say, Don't fret, dear.
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We're having the time of our lives.
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Uh oh.
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We're having the time.
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The time of our lives.
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Wicked daughter.