Rehab at Home

As from May 20th 2015 when Willie come home we waited for confirmation that he would go to a rehabilitation centre as he had to learn to walk, dress himself, bathroom routines and even hold a spoon to eat as he was to weak to do the everyday basic routines for himself.

It became clear that rehab in a clinic would not materialized as the medical insurance and the pension fund had a disagreement on who will pay for the clinic as both wanted to pass the bucket to each other. We did not receive the walker for the same reason. Our house doctor wrote multiple letters to both organisations and managed to get one of them to pay for the walker. When that was settled and the walker was on its way, the Deutsche Postal Service went on strike and the delivery of the walker was delayed for another week.

We decided not to relay on promises and wait before Willie could start with rehab. We prayed and asked God for wisdom. I placed chairs in the passage, two steps apart and hold Willie around the waist and lead him from chair to chair and allow him to rest at each chair. Later I moved the chairs one step further from each other so that Willie could walk one step further before he took a rest. This we did daily with more steps between the chairs when I saw that he could manage that.

Willie came home, still having a catheter with a small "tap" and he had to drink water and trained his bladder to expand by waiting for some time before he could release himself. This exercise was necessary because he was on dialysis from before he went into a coma until he came out of a coma.

One night he wanted to go to the bathroom to release himself and I walk backwards in front of him, holding him around his waist. One step outside our bedroom he said, "my knees" and he collapsed. I pulled him to me and we both went down. Laying on the floor in the passage, we prayed. I could not pick him up and he could not get up by himself. I fetched pillows and placed in under his head and we lay together on the floor. The floor was not to cold as we had under floor heating. We prayed and I asked for wisdom to get Willie back in bed. We prayed that he will regain strength to work with me.

I pulled he legs to his chest and rolled him over to get him on his knees. Then I went on my knees next to him and I started crawling and urged him to do the same. We managed to get to the bed. I helped him to put his arms on the bed, standing on his knees and rest with his head on the bed. We prayed and thank God that we were next to the bed. We ask for wisdom to get Willie onto the bed. We both stand on our knees, lying forward with our upper bodies on the bed.

Then I remembered that the pillows on the sofa are hard and thick pillows and if I could get that under Willie's knees, I might get him a bit higher from the floor. I run and fetched two pillows in the living room. I kept speaking to Willie and encourage him to keep his arms on the bed and stay upright on his knees. I came back with the pillows and placed it next to him, one on each side. I said to Willie I would count to three and when I lift his one knee, he had to work with me and try his best to help me. I did the same with the other knee. It was still not high enough and I had to fetch two more pillows. Going through the same process.

After I had two pillows under both knees, I said it was time to pray and praise God for helping us to get so far. I said Willie sound lift his arm and praise God. As he did that, I punched him in the back and with the momentum, I threw him on the bed. He did not know what happened to him, only knew he was on the bed. I fetch a bucket to empty his bladder and said from then on we will use the bucket until the walker arrived. This entire episode took as an hour to get Willie back in bed. Needless to say we both were totally exhausted.