Thursday, July 30

On Tuesday afternoon, Tommy got a beard trim (much-needed...I told him he was too young to look like Gabby Hayes). Kirsten (who will be Tommy's home-health-care aide for a month, maybe more) did a great job. Next Tuesday, Kirsten is going to cut Tommy's hair, and she is teaching me in the process. Her husband trained to be a barber and has taught her; she says he doesn't have a barber shop yet but hopes to eventually open one. Kirsten is also a barrel of fun. What a treat.
Yesterday, Tommy saw Dr. Giddins, his new primary-care doctor. She told Tommy several times how great he looks and that unless something else comes up she wants to see him in the usual three months. Everything turned around for Tommy when he saw Dr. DeMarco in Salisbury on July 13 for that emergency "second opinion" on his inability-to-urinate-at-all problem, and Dr. DeMarco took care of that by irrigating Tommy's bladder. During that same visit, his nurse, Jeanne, told me that there is a doctor named Dr. Giddins who is affiliated with their hospital (Peninsula Regional Medical Center, or PRMC, in Salisbury) who has an office right next to our post office in Ocean View! Dr. Giddins saw Tommy two days later, and she helped Tommy get over the pain hump (including making a call to Dr. DeMarco's office while we were there, which was the kind of communication that had not been happening with so many of the doctors we had previously been seeing). Finally, we could get some sleep. Dr. Giddins also called in the home-health-care troops from PRMC (which will now be our hospital of choice), and so for the past week these folks have been getting Tommy back up to speed: Mariel, the R.N. (who helped me with the fine points of catheter/bladder-irrigation techniques); Scott (physical therapy, who has a garage full of boats so he and Tommy are instant pals); Megan (occupational therapy, who finally solved my longtime problem of how to keep the bathroom floor dry during the shower when the shower bench sticks out into the room); and, of course, Kirsten.
In the spring, Irv, Tommy and I agreed that our big project this summer would be to go surf fishing. So, Irv and I got Irv's pickup truck registered and ready for us to take Tommy surf fishing. Now we can finally start to think about that!