Home - Update 8 on Dad

We're home!! We pulled in yesterday afternoon around 4:30 and I nearly kissed the ground from excitement. I'm serious - its rough being trapped in a two seat convertible for two days. The backseat, where I spent most of my time, is cramped, drafty, and noisy. All whining aside, we had an uneventful trip.

Weather-wise, other than a lovely snow storm in South Haven, we either made it through an area just after a storm hit and the road was cleared or just before it came through. In KS there was mile after mile of frosted and frozen trees - Gorgeous! No photos of course :( We came through IA just after a snowstorm and passed about 10 spots where vehicles had slid off into the median or the ditch. Several had already been pulled out or were in the process of being pulled but of the others that were still there for our gawking pleasure, there were two still resting on their roofs. Yikes! Praise God for protecting us.

Another interesting factor in our trip was the temperature. The temperature outside steadily dropped as we traveled through CO, NE, KS, IA, and IL, but it grew warmer as we neared home. When mom pre-started our car yesterday morning at our hotel in IA, it was -13° with a windchill of -31°. DOUBLE BRRRRRR! It was kind of fun to watch the temperature gage go up and down as we drove from state to state. No comments please - you try and find things to entertain three people in a 24 hour car ride :)

Dad's condition continues to improve. He meets again tomorrow with Dr Jabara (MI Surgeon) for a second follow up appointment. Thursday he has an appointment with the Infectious Disease doctor that Dr Hackenberg (CO Infec. Dis.) referred him to. As I said in a prior post, he will continue to meet weekly with the Infectious Disease doctor until the bacteria is out of his body. It typically takes about 6-10 weeks. Each night he has an infusion of Cubicin to treat the staph infection. After we got home last night, and following our celebratory family dinner, mom walked through the process with Steph and Leah. As Brenda so adequately put it, any monkey can do it. Its tedious but not difficult to figure out so it'll just become part of the nightly routine around the Turner home.

One other point of interest - The staph infection that dad has is a type of epi-infection. Epi infections are skin based infections. This means that either an instrument or person that was involved in his initial surgery had not been properly disinfected or cleaned and skin bacteria was transferred into the surgical site and joint. There is no way of knowing who or what or even how but an epi infection is a slow growing infection with potentially fatal results if not properly treated. Dad left the operating table with the infection but the effects weren't noticeable until over a week later. If he would have tried to return to MI for treatment, the likelihood is high that he would have lost not only his arm but potentially his life. Praise the Lord for good doctors and the good sense to listen to their advisement.

Praises - safety in travel and continued healing in Dad's body.
Prayers - dad continues to have sweats and chills, mainly in the evenings. Each time his temperature is taken, it checks out, but the whole process wears him out. His shoulder continues to heal and ache. Before the trip, he was doing well with little pain but now he has some level of constant pain.