At about 9.30am I got up and no sooner had I left the bedroom, than Abbie jumped out of the bedroom she was sharing with her mam. She had been awake for “hours” apparently and was keen to be kept amused.

Cue Diversions !! I put the computer on, and got the TV onto CBeebies and then I was safe to make my exit walking the dogs !

When I got back, Adele was up and I got kp up. kp was in a lot of pain today . I had woken kp up and put the new patch on before dog walking because I felt the pain was on the way after last night. So, when kp got up for good, I gave her a bath and a long soak as that has proven to help on previous occasions. We then had breakfast. Abbie was keen to write her own blog of last night (published already) and was amazed at her work being on t’internet.

kp was feeling so full of aches and pains that we booked a Doctor’s appointment for the afternoon and to avoid having to deal with the pain, she we went for a lie-down until 4pm. I joined her.

The Doctor wasn’t our usual one, but he turned out to be really good, but also dropped a bit of a bombshell on Karen. On the good front, he came up with a novel fix for Karen’s pain. The patches Karen is on don’t come in any larger sizes than 100ug, and the pain always seems to be worse on the last day of the 3-day patch cycle. So he suggested putting Karen on 2 patches. On Day One, we apply the 100ug patch and on Day 3, we apply the additional 25ug patch. Day 4 sees the new 100ug patch and Day 6 the new 25ug patch. It should work a treat !!!

Great News ! And then the bombshell.

kp asked him how long do people normally take to recover from a stroke. Well, in my head, by the end of 2 years, the amount of recovery shown is normally what you end up with, sometimes this can be as long as 3 years.

The Doctor said……

Doctor :- “Normally after 1 year, the recovery you have is what you are left with…”

He went on to say….

Doctor :- “So, I suspect what you have recovered now is about what you are going to get.”

He said this in a very nice way, btw, not as abruptly as this reads back !

Yikes. I wasn’t ready for that curveball. I was immediately thinking of kp and the fact that this would hit her like a brick !! But I kept my cool.

On the way out, she asked me to explain the patch cycle to her and made no reference to the bombshell news.

Deep inside, I think Karen feels she is going to get full recovery and be 100% the old kp physically (and probably mentally). Now is not the right time to discuss the fact it may only be 90% (or less).

By the time we had got to the chemist, kp had started to question the bombshell news. Still no tears though.

When we got home, there were still no tears, but I could tell she was thinking about it.

As I write this blog entry, tea is on the go and kp is watching “Deal or No Deal” and we haven’t had any tears, but knowing Karen, sometime in the next day or so, this will hit her and hit her hard and I fear this is going to be the “Biggie” upset wise.

Fingers crossed that she doesn’t get too upset.

Uneventful Day today, but a nice one.

kp was up by about 10.30am. I went to the chemist to get the new 25ug patches. We had breakfast outside today as it was such a beautiful day. While we were sipping our tea/coffee, we had a visit from a woodpecker. Normally, he lands, sees us and buggers off, but today, he/she must have been hungry, so I tried to snap a picture. As usual, it didn’t come out very well !

CLICK ON THE PICTURE TO ENLARGE IT

Well, we haven’t discussed the news and I am not going to raise it unless she does. Most of the afternoon, we spent snoozing.

Uneventful Day.

kp was feeling a bit mentally under the weather and didn’t want to speak to anyone today So phonecalls went unanswered.

We applied the dinky 25ug patch and it seemed to help a little, later in the day.

I have been reading out some of Karen’s medical notes to her, they are REALLY hard going ! That’s it.

Karen got up about 1.30am and didn’t come back to bed until 5am (unbeknownst to me)

She was feeling depressed she told me this morning. We both had a really bad day today.

Normally we make a really good couple, when kp is down, I pick her up, and vice versa. Today……….

kp:- Why do I bother carrying on ? I feel like ending it all, but I am too much of a coward.

dp:- I know how you feel love. What IS the point ?

We carried on to have a conversation trying to find some purpose to our lives. We didn’t find any.

The nub of it is we have a lovely house, dogs, car, etc etc… and we love each other very much, but what are we here for ?!

Both Karen and I really wanted kids, and as bloggers who know us, will know, we can’t have our own kids for various reasons…so when the IVF process ends, it leaves you with a kind of “what now ?!”. We did adoption, and could have had kids that way, but we wanted our OWN kids.

I think we are now at a point, where we have got kp through the worst of her accident and her rehab and now it is a case of just working at kp’s rehab, but with time to think of the big picture.

We are both struggling with it. Neither of us has answers

But, thanks to the NP, we know that distraction helps kp get through these bad times (me too), so false as it may be, we need to come up with 5 days a week distractions and 2 days a week for ourselves to restrengthen.

That’s our short/medium term plan.

We have decided to try and keep things busy to get us through this bad patch. We started today. We went to the shops to get some food in for Angela and Chrissy’s visit tomorrow. I let kp go into the butchers on her own while I dropped a letter off at the Post Box. I came back to the butchers to find kp chasing a pound coin (she had dropped) round the butcher’s floor to pay him. She then offered to cross the road herself while I went to the chemist. NO WAY JOSE !!!!! That was NOT going to happen. kp doesn’t see things on the left, and I could well imagine another hospital stay if she tried to cross the road on her own.

When we got home, we did an extended physio session, trying to keep busy….

Here is kp polishing the table with her left arm ….

And here is kp trying to move her walking stick in the air with her left and right hands…..

That’s it for today. Fingers crossed for a better day tomorrow….I seemed to say that a lot recently !

Something I forgot to mention yesterday.

When we went to the local co-op to get some shopping, kp started looking round for items on the list.

kp:- I can’t see anything. I can’t seem to focus.

She went on to describe how she couldn’t read the labels as quickly as she could before.

Another thing in the shop which I should record is when Geraldine (our next but one door-neighbour) came up behind Karen and said “hello” to me (because I saw her first). kp turned round to look who it was, and immediately looked at me with the biggest scared face as if to say “WHO IS IT ?”.

I told kp it was Geraldine, and she apologised to Geraldine for not recognising her. I think she understood. Unusual for kp not to recognise her though.

Well, kp and I had a bit of a bad night’s sleep. We got up about 2am and went back to bed about 3am. The events of the day were still on our minds.

Today was a new day however, and we didn’t discuss yesterday apart from to say we felt better about things. Probably because we had visitors due in the afternoon.

At about 1pm, Angela and Chrissy (workmates of Karen’s) came to visit. Chrissy had baked 2 lovely cakes which was very kind of her. We all enjoyed hours of chinwagging with a mini-buffet that kp and I had both prepared. It was a really nice afternoon.

Angela mentioned that the driver of the vehicle was going to be sentenced in March, and that it wouldn’t be referred up to Crown Court. So, I think we are intending to go to that.

We had a lovely blog comment from Adele, which I think cheered kp up a bit, which was nice.

That’s it for today.

I am so forgetful. I have forgotten another couple of interesting titbits from yesterday.

Angela was telling us about how she had been to visit the greenkeeper from the golf course next to where the car crash was. He had been one of the first on the scene and had looked after Angela and held her head whilst the fire crews were cutting her free. She recounted a very emotional meeting with him. It was lovely to hear and both her and the greenkeeper got a great deal out of the meeting.

She also found out that the other greenkeeper had done the same for Karen. Karen isn’t anywhere near that kind of meeting yet, but in the fullness of time, I hope she wants to meet up with him, so we can thank him for everything he did. At least they know the girls are alive, which they didn’t until Angela’s visit.

Following this, Chrissy told the story of the accident from work’s perspective, and I found this very moving. I didn’t quite cry, but I wasn’t far off as she recalled how work had gathered them all together to tell them of the bad news and how critical kp was. It REALLY brought those few days back to me. It was an awful time.

kp was full of aches and pains this morning, with her back especially giving her gip.

I went to pick Marie, Adele, Abbie and Louisa up in Durham for their stayover. We had a really good afternoon. Louisa (2) seems to be particulary keen on men, and within 30 minutes of arriving, she seemed glued to me. I loved it !

Here are Abbie and Louisa on one of our chairs moments after they arrived.

Louisa then came in the computer room and sat on my lap as I typed emails. Here she is with my glasses on.

When it came to going out, she wanted me to get her ready, put her trousers and top on, change her shoes etc…. NO PROBLEM !!!

Louisa :- David, wee weee………… (she wanted me to take her to the loo)

YIKES !!!!!!!!!! EMERGENCY ESCAPE BUTTON NEEDED !!!!

I don’t do Nappies, Pull-up pants and trips to the loo. I must get a sign saying this at the threshold to our house. Will all visitors to Chez Pollard please note this for future.

We went out to the local fun factory place and the kids ran themselves ragged.

£2 for as long as they wanted and Louisa went free. MONEY WELL SPENT. The only problem is you have to stay on the premises, so we couldn’t collect them tomorrow.

An extra 50p each for face painting…..

Abbie is a butterfly, and Louisa is a princess in case it wasn’t obvious.

Karen and I have really enjoyed their company and had lots of good laughs. It’s 9.30pm and the kids are still wide awake. When I was a lad, I had to be in bed by 6pm, those were the days !

That’s it for today.

Well, it turned out to be a late night last night. Louisa (2) went to bed about 10.30pm and was out like a light. SNORING like an old woman. Click on SNORING to see her in action.

kp and I were next about 11.30pm and then sometime later Marie, Adele and Abbie. With such a fun-packed day and such a late night, you would think the kids would have been asleep until 10am. I can hear Parent bloggers in my head saying “Oh no, they wouldn’t”. You are, of course, right. They were up at about 7.30am, and thankfully Marie was up with them keeping them amused.

Uneventful day today, I dropped everyone off in Durham and kp and I had a quiet afternoon, with a visit to the doctors for kp in the middle of the afternoon. Throw in the usual snooze and that’s it. We are looking forward to a day to ourselves tomororw

Uneventful Day. We stayed in and chatted a lot of the day about this and that.

Nice, quiet day. The highlight of the day (it doesn’t get much more exciting than this) was……………………exercises

kp did all her usual exercises and then remembered the “sorting buttons” exercise that she did at the physio hospital. We did sorting “pills”………kp takes one pill from one bowl and puts it in the other one.

Obviously, “we did sorting pills” means Karen sorted them. I just kept going “nice one” and “oh, that was a tricky one” for the smaller pills

She did very well and I could see an improvement on the last time. Before, it was like a crane going down for a toy at the arcades and fingers crossed whether you got a toy or not. This time, it was more like 2 fingers grasping a pill carefully. It’s nowhere near like she could do with her right hand, and she chased the smallest pill round the table for quite some time before she got it, but it is a definate improvement !!!

Well, we have had a good day today. We both went to sleep about 11.30pm, kp not thinking she would be able to get to sleep given the afternoon snooze, but we both had a really good kip and were up and about by 9am (unheard of for kp).

When I went walking the dogs, there was a “Doctor on Call” at our ace next door neighbours (Tommy and Eileen). When I came back from walking the dogs, there was a “Doctor on call” and TWO ambulances outside !! YIKES !!!

By the time I had got Karen ready, they were taking Eileen into hospital while Tommy was laid up with a very bad case of the flu.

Eileen is ok now, but it didn’t half give Karen and I a scare.

After breakfast, kp and I went round to the local shop for essential supplies.

She did very well. On the way back, Karen wondered what would happen if she tried to walk quicker. (She walks extremely slowly (1mph)). Well, she opened the throttle up and in no time was cruising along at a speedy 2mph, before throttling back to her 1mph pace. Pain was setting in.

She was a bit worse for wear after the walk and we both went to bed.

When we got up from the snooze, we went round to Tommy and Eileen’s to check all was ok. Tommy was still full of flu, and Eileen seemed under the weather, but they were “ok”. We had a nice chat with Eileen and Bev.

Michelle and Freddy also came this afternoon bringing with them Ethan who we haven’t seen in ages.

He was more interested in playing on the computer than seeing Uncle David and Aunty Karen.

Pizza Night tonight

This is just a quick blog entry to thank all the bloggers who have left messages for Karen. ALL of your messages get forwarded to Karen’s email address and she reads them all.

So, Bernie, Wendy Widelegs and Ethan – thanks for your blogs. If you want to contact Karen direct (which she would like very much), her email address is kp@karen-pollard.com

Good start, bad finish sums up today. We had a few odd jobs to do today. I had some paperwork to do, and kp had to plan our nightly menus and shopping list (for tomorrow).

So, we had a nice breakfast together, and went for a snooze because we had been up for a couple of hours during the night. Like we need an excuse !

After breakfast, kp started to get very quiet and didn’t want to do her menus/shopping list. In her words, she was feeling very flat.

She just sat very quietly and watched tv and then went back to bed, where she is now. Fingers crossed, she wakes up feeling a bit more “with it”.

Uneventful day.

Just a little example of kp’s mental problem that has just arisen.

After her snooze, she got up and decided to do the menus/shopping list for the week.

She wrote up Monday’s menu (Roast Chicken) in the living room and went into the kitchen to check the supplies we have in to do Roast Chicken. She came back in to the living room to write up the shopping list and then did tuesday’s menu and went back in to the kitchen to check supplies and then returned.

I suggested doing the whole week’s menu and then doing ONE trip to the kitchen …

kp:- “My mind doesn’t work like that anymore. Let me do it my way.”

Anyway 5 trips later, we have menu and recipes done

Tissues at the ready.

A sad day today, or maybe it’s just me.

Early start today, with kp getting up around 8.30am (that’s early for kp). We had a visit to the OT today for “assessments”. I think the OT realised the other week that kp wasn’t 100% from a mental perspective and she rightly felt that this needs to be further assessed so the right treatment can be given. So today, kp had 11 assessments.

We had psyched ourselves up for 1 or 2 tests but not 11. All in all, we were there for about 2 hours.

I won’t recall all the tests, but I will try and give a flavour of what kp went through.

Early on, there was a test where kp was presented with a series of strange shapes (on the left hand side of the table). She was then presented with a more complex shape which had (somewhere in it) one of the shapes she had on the left. She had to trace the easy shape within the complex diagram. It sounds complicated, but it wasn’t as hard as it sounds. She got about 6 out of 10 right where most people would get them all. The other 4, she argued with the OT, that those shapes weren’t present in the diagrams on the right at all. The OT showed her where they were.

kp:- oh yeah

She had a few more shape related ones, things like recreating the diagram you see on the left on a blank piece of paper on the right. Sounds easy, but for Karen (who doesn’t see a lot of things if they are to the left), she missed out key parts of the diagrams and couldn’t see that they were missing.

All the tests were timed, and they weren’t considered over until Karen said she was finished.

An interesting result of one tests was that Karen was presented with 2 straight lines, one was a very short straight line, the other was long (going the full width of the paper). Karen had to mark where she thought the middle of each line was. I have marked in red where kp thought the middle of each line was.

Now, I thought it very strange how she nearly got the little one correct, but was so off on the big one. The OT went on to explain, that Karen doesn’t see as long as line as we do. She misses a lot of the left hand side out, so that IS the middle from her point of view. I found this a little sad, but intriguing.

So, by this time, Karen probably had about 6 or 7 tests behind her, and had done “ok”. She hadn’t got everything right in a test (which a stroke-free person would have done), but she had got SOME right. So, I expect at this stage, kp was getting more than a little frustrated with the tests and herself. Then came the crunch test.

kp was presented with 10 cards, each had a picture of a face at a different angle. Imagine spinning someone round on a chair and taking 10 photos of their head as it turned round. Karen had to rearrange the cards so that they were in the correct order. In other words, they showed the head at all the different angles (in the right order) until the head had rotated 360′.

The assistant OT started the clock and kp just stared at the heads. 1 minute passed with the occasional furtive hand gesture as if she was going to rearrange them, but she didn’t.

The OT stepped in at this point and reread the instructions.

Another 30 seconds passed, and I could see tears welling up in her eyes. And then the tears and upset came on full force.

kp:- I don’t get it. I don’t understand it at all.

Karen (pre-accident) would have walked this test and been shouting all the way through “Yes, YES, YESSS !”, but instead she was demoralised and very upset.

I comforted her and tried to make her see that it wasn’t that big a deal, but she then said :-

kp:- But, I know I could have done this before.
dp:- Yes, but the OT is going to show you tips for how you can get round this problem in the future

No words really helped. It was so so sad !

The OT showed her the first 3 heads, and asked if kp could carry on. She thought about it for another minute it……..

kp:- (shaking her head)…… I don’t get it

This test was shelved while kp had a few more tears.

We then took a tea-break. After the tea-break, kp’s tactile sensations were tested.

kp put her hand in a covered box (so she couldn’t see what was being given to her) and she had to feel what she had been given. The OT tested her dominant (right) hand first. She got 10 out of 10, feeling things like a cup, brillo pad, metal, glass, rubber, wool etc etc…

It was her left hand’s turn. Things weren’t quite so rosy but neither kp nor I thought she would be too hot at this one. She was given ……
a pair of scissors – Karen said it was “a fork”
a glove – Karen said it was a “washing up cloth”
a paperclip – Karen said it was a “twig”

Suffice to say, she didn’t get any right, BUT she was able to laugh at how wrong she was which was good.

Actually, she did get one right, but not quite legitimately. She was feeling something for quite a while and by accident it slipped out of her side of the box (so she could see what it was). It was a cotton reel.

kp:- ermmm…..Cotton Reel
The OT looked impressed until kp put the cotton reel on top of the box with all the other objects.

We laughed for a while about that.

We then had a test which kp got 100% right !!!

It was about 6 pictures and she had to put them in an order that made sense. It was pilots walking to Concorde, it taxiing, taking off, cruising and landing (something like that).

So, things were looking up.

We then had some trickier tests. One involved rubber stamp blocks (plus ink). It was a MESSY test.

kp had about 10 different ink stamps on her left (all different shapes) and she was shown a diagram of a pattern that consisted of quite a few of those shapes and she had to recreate it with the rubber stamps on some blank paper. She was allowed to hold the rubber stamps over the shown pattern to work out if they were right or not.

For example, kp would be shown the following :-

And she would have to find the little triangle rubber stamp and the other rubber stamp for the bottom half.

kp really struggled with these. For example, in this one, she would eventually find the bottom part, but would pick the completely wrong size triangle for the top part. She got it on the 2nd or 3rd attempt however.

Halfway through this test, kp broke down again. She couldn’t find the shapes she was looking for. It is SO heartbreaking looking on at her struggling so much. At times like this, I feel so much anger to the driver of the car that caused this accident.

The next test was a bit more fun. It was a bit like the game “Operation”, where you have to get the bones out of the patient without letting the buzzer go off. Well, kp was given a stabbing device with a needle on the end and starting off with the largest hole, she had to place it into the hole WITHOUT touching the metal needle against the metal hole. The holes were numbered and got progressively harder until the needle ONLY just fits. She was allowed 3 attempts at each hole. She started off with her good hand and of the 30 holes, she completed 29 !!!! I was WELL impressed. I was looking on, thinking I could get to about 25, and kp would get about the same, and she nearly completed it and got all 30 !!!!

CLICK ON THE PICTURE TO ENLARGE IT

Then came the left hand. The left hand takes a lot longer, but although she had to use a lot more of her 3 lifelines per hole, she managed to get to hole 18 !! I would put money on the fact, that if Karen had been given this task 3 or 4 weeks ago, she would have only got to number 10 or so !!! I was well happy with 18 !

Then came the final test. Another bit of fun, but very frustrating for Karen. She had to make a coat hanger with a special machine and a set of instructions. She started off with a 1.5m piece of sturdy wire.

An example instruction would be ………

1. Move lever A so that it is positioned between the parallel lines.

kp struggled with this.

And an instruction like…..

11. Position the wire in front of the metal stopper so it falls between the runners on Lever C, then Pull Lever C until it reaches the metal stop……….

Well, kp had to break it down into 4 or 5 steps and then kept losing her place when she went back to the instructions.

With help, she got there in the end though. Here is kp working the final part of the coat hanger on the machine….

CLICK ON THE PICTURE TO ENLARGE IT

And here is the finished result…..

CLICK ON THE PICTURE TO ENLARGE IT

Karen and I have decided to have a bit of a laugh with the coat hanger and raise a few pence/pounds for charity in the process. If you would like to buy a coat hanger that Karen made herself, then please place your bid by adding a comment to this blog entry. Starting price is 50p. Increments of 50p only please. Auction ends Thursday 9th March at 7pm. The charity is “Marrow Transplant 2000″ and it supports Haemotology patients in the UK. It’s a charity that Marie and the family have supported since Lee’s (Karen’s nephew) death from Leukaemia (aged 18).

From 7pm tonight, you can also bid for the coat hanger on ebay by clicking HERE

The highest bid, between ebay and here wins.

We left physio with kp feeling very deflated. We went shopping at Sainsburys but kp just wanted to get home.

She went straight to bed.

Marie is staying tonight, so hopefully some chat with Marie will take kp’s mind off today. A sad day.

Wahey, kp has just reminded me of an absolute corker that was brought up today, which I was completely oblivious too. Let me set the scene……Regular bloggers will remember that kp went with 2 OTs (Occupational Therapists) on a shopping trip to Sainsburys a few weeks ago.

Well, today, kp had finished one of the tests and not done too well on it. She asked the OT what does this test mean ? The OT explained………

OT :- Well, this test tests your spatial awareness. For example, how aware are you of things around you. And also how aware are you that certain things will fit into certain other things.

kp looked puzzled.

OT :- Do you remember when we all went to Sainsburys and you were pushing round the shopping trolley ?
kp :- Yes
OT :- Well, do you remember when you came up to a pillar in the middle of an aisle and you tried to go to the left of the pillar and you were convinced the trolley would fit between the pillar and the shelves. You thought it would fit through, and couldn’t work out why it wouldn’t and you just kept ramming the trolley against the pillar, not accepting that it wouldn’t fit.

Well, at this point, I was in stitches. kp had forgotten to relay this story, and we were all laughing over it.

kp did remember !

A good night’s sleep for kp, only getting up twice in the night.

Marie spent most of the morning “jobbing on” around our house. As always Marie, thanks.

I took Marie to the hairdressers for 10.30am and before I collected her at 12.30pm, I got kp up. She wasn’t in as much pain as when she went to bed. Her left shoulder/arm has been giving her a lot of gip with loud “ow’s” prominent in the night if I touched it and sleepy warnings if I turned around in the night and got within a few inches.

We had a nice “Toasted Teacake” breakfast (brunch) and Marie + kp spent most of the afternoon gassing. I think it was the first bit of quality time with kp that Marie has had in a while, because of kp’s tendency to have an afternoon nap.

kp has gone for a snooze until tea is ready. She has still been a bit flat today overall, but perkier than yesterday, so hopefully we are heading in the right direction.

Tomorrow we have physio.

If you want to help raise some money for charity, don’t forget there are another 9 days to bid on a coat hanger that Karen made at the OT session yesterday. You can bid by placing a comment on the blog or by clicking HERE. The bidding is up to £1.20 !!!

Finally, a good day for Karen. It seems like she had a long wait for this one.

Physio today. kp’s physio had been away for 5 weeks and we were hoping that she may be able to do something to ease Karen’s pain in her left (and right) shoulder. After a discussion about her aches and pains, the physio set about sorting kp out. She started by seeing how much Karen could move her left shoulder. Everyday kp and I do, what we call, the gorilla exercises. It basically involves pushing your shoulders back and your chest forward and holding it for a few seconds, and then reversing that, and holding your shoulders back and hunching your arms like a gorilla in front of you. When kp does this (everyday), the left shoulder hardly moves and the right seems to do all the work. All to do with the stroke weakness. When kp did this for the physio today, it was just the same. Very little movement.

So, the physio set about trying to loosen up the left shoulder. She applied some cream she had bought from the other side of the world and gave Karen a massage. The slightest touch (to start of) resulted in big OW’s and the Physio had to start by making it a light massage. Gradually she made it harder and harder and the area got REALLY red.

She followed this up with some exercises and various other bits of physio and then asked Karen to try the same gorilla exercises.

One, they caused NO Pain and two, I could see the shoulder had more free movement. kp was really pleased that what we had thought MAY have helped (a visit to the OT) had actually sorted the problem out.

So, we both had big grins as we left the hospital.

We have been given some tips to prevent it stiffening up again and some slightly different gorilla exercises. kp’s mood has lifted with the pain and all is ok in the Pollard household tonight.

Good News on the coat hanger auction. It’s up to a massive £16 !!!! Thanks to all the bidders who got it so high !!! Anyone want to make it £20 ? Then CLICK HERE. All proceeds go to “Marrow Transplant 2000″.

Shortish blog today, given most of the action will be tonight when Jane and Ronnie converge on Chez Pollard.

Karen woke up with a bit of a stiff left shoulder, and we both feared that it may be on its way back with a vengeance. But I gave her a 10-minute ralgex rub (massage) and it seemed to fend it off.

At 12pm, we had a visit from kp’s boss and personnel to discuss kp and her situation at work. They brought flowers, which was nice, and started by asking how kp was. They seemed to understand it will be a long recovery, but at the same time, they have to think of the practicalities of the situation. Karen did very well taking everything in, and although she had to ask for a repeat of some information, she seemed to take it all in and I hardly had to do any talking. She got a little upset and there were a few tears, when they hinted about ill health retirement effectively ruling out her return to work. kp (and I) feels she needs to keep hold of her aim to go back to work. Ruling it out just shuts a door in her face and she doesn’t want to hear doors slamming at the moment.

With the meeting over, you can probably guess what happened next. Sleep. She has been asleep since about 2pm. I need to get her up shortly in time for the arrival of Jane and Ronnie. Chinese tonight.

Well, we had a great night with Ronnie and Jane. Jane had us in absolute stitches as per usual, and I have no doubt it did kp the world of good. Ronnie attended kp’s clinic to sort all her problems out, and Jane and kp handed out good advice.

Lovely chinese. I retired about 10pm, when conversation took the usual dive into men, women’s problem and other non-savoury topics.

I think kp came to bed about 2am. So, about 2pm, I’ll try and wake the beast

Well, I have since learned it was 2.45am when kp went to sleep.

Jane got up and shot off at 9am, she was going away for the weekend with Tony. Ronnie was up at a reasonable time, but when noone surfaced for breakfast with her, she returned for a snooze. The Pollard household was up and about by about 1pm.

Lots of chatting today, lots of catching up. Very little action !

At about 3pm, kp returned to bed. Ronnie fell asleep on the sofa. Both girls are still asleep, lucky I am a dab hand at twiddling my thumbs.

Roast Pork tonight.

That’s it !! Let’s hope for a more interesting blog entry tomorrow.

Well, kp was up at a reasonable time of 9am today to greet me when I came back from walking the dogs. We had some brekky, then went back to bed until 12pm.

We had a second breakfast (cooked) with Ronnie, before the girls decided to go to Cotton Traders at Dalton Park. It feels very strange when Karen leaves me. And today, I really missed her. I always like to know where she is when she is around the house, and when she goes away in someone elses car, I wonder if she may be going away for another 7 months. Stupid I know ! But it’s a real strong feeling.

I was very relieved when she got home. Ronnie had took some photos while they were out. Apparently, they had had a wonderful time. Karen really enjoyed being out with her friend, she felt like it was a bit of normality.

They came a bit unstuck, when kp went shopping for brassieres. I think Ronnie managed to undress kp ok, but when it came to putting kp’s jumper back on, she got the head half on, but couldn’t work out how to get her left arm through.

Ronnie :- How do I do the next bit ?
kp (head invisible underneath her jumper) :- I don’t know, I can’t see what you have done.

Apparently, they had a good laugh about it.

Since they have come back, we have been trying to get Ronnie hooked up with a fella at various dating sites. When we have completed her profile, I will add a link in here in the hope of attracting a bit more attention.

Here are some photos vd did of kp….

Great night last night. Karen ordered the pizzas but only Ronnie got the right pizza. It was the pizzaman’s fault of course !

We watched Saturday night tv and had lots of fun chats. We got Ronnie registered on a dating website DatingDirect.com.

I couldn’t persuade her to be a “Woman” looking for a “Woman”. She had to pick the “Woman” looking for a “Man” option. I couldn’t find her today when I tried to advertise her on the blog site. Within 5 miles of her postcode (in London), there are over one hundred 40 year olds ?! And it wouldn’t let me get any further unless I registered. If I had registered, you could bet your life kp would walk in half way through wondering why I was looking for women on websites – much older women at that !

kp was all aches and pains today. Long walks are a real struggle for kp and Dalton Park took its toll. She had a hot bath last night and it didn’t really help. She took extra pain relief today (Diclofenac and Codeine).

We bade goodbye to Ronnie at 11am. She had to get back for her nephew’s birthday bash and at 1pm Kevin (kp’s work colleague from the same car) and his family came for an hour. The kids were dying to meet the dogs and were in fits of giggles at being licked to death by them.

When Kevin went, we went for a snooze. That’s it for today. Action packed week this week…..

Monday – Physio (morning), Meal out with Family (evening)
Tuesday – OT in the afternoon
Wednesday – The chap who caused the accident gets sentenced. We are attending court.
Thursday – kp’s work colleagues visiting
Friday – Adele coming

Looking forward to it.

For the last month or so, kp has been having the biggest sweats in the middle of the night and we have been racking our brains to work out what it is. For the past 2 weeks, we have taken 2 nighties to bed, so she can change one in the middle of the night, the sweats are THAT bad.

Ronnie stayed this weekend and the same night kp had a bad sweating episode, I was also a bit sweaty. We mentioned this to Ronnie.

Ronnie – Have you tried changing your duvet ?

The same night, we swapped duvets, and ever since then have been fine. I think kp and I should win some sort of award for the “dumbest couple in Durham”.

Physio today. kp’s shoulder has been a lot better since last week’s physio, but she has still had some twinges over the last day or so, so today’s session was spent loosening it up again. After some massage, the physio decided to see how well kp could reach with her left hand/arm compared to when this was done a month or so ago. The aim of the game is to move the cones into the middle of the rings, with the rings being moved progressively further away. kp’s arm has definately improved !!! Her reach is longer, and her hand control is better. I was well proud.

Shopping followed physio. And by the time shopping was done, kp was flagging big time. Quick bite to eat and then bed.

7pm tonight we were at Chevitas in Durham for a lovely meal with Dave, Yvonne, Chris, Craig and Laura. The food was excellent, and we had a really good night. Even better, it was the Gall’s treat

Sorry about the picture quality….

Upsetting Day today.

kp was up before me ! That’s a first ! And when I got up, she came back to bed until I had walked the dogs.

We had a busy morning ringing various associations, doctors, chemists, consultants. kp is due to have another operation to sew up her stomach muscles, and was going to be referred for hydrotherapy, so we chased both those issues with Sunderland Hospital.

At 3pm, the OT arrived to give Karen the results of the tests from last week.

It took about 15 minutes to get through the results and although there were no big surprises, by the end of it Karen was in tears

Karen was told the following :-

Her visual perception (how her brain perceives what is going on) is significantly impaired. Real life examples were given along the lines of

• not seeing all the food on her plate
• not seeing cars when she crosses roads
• not seeing cars or pedestrians if she was driving

She has a problem processing information. If she receives instructions, she has big problems taking them in and needs them broken down into single instructions. It also takes a long time to get the instructions into her brain. Real life examples were given such as the instructions for the coat hanger which she couldn’t take in from last week’s test. If she receives a phonecall with lots of information, she wouldn’t be able to relay it all back to someone (something we know to be the case).

Her sensory motor skills are not what they were with Karen taking a lot more time to do a simple task than she would have otherwise have done.

On the good side, her memory is still ok.

The OT went on to say that these tests mean she would not be allowed to drive a car at the moment and that she shouldn’t go outside (crossing roads) on her own, she also mentioned she shouldn’t be even thinking about going back to work at the moment, and added that visits from her work aren’t appropriate given that she shouldn’t be making big decisions at the present time.

All of this hits kp hard. I asked for a copy of the results and could see that quite a few of the tests were marked as “severely impaired”.

kp feels like she is psychologically being “beaten up” by these results. NOTHING AGAINST the OT here !! She understands that she needs to see where she is weak so she can work on it, but she still feels like she is being roughed up.

She made reference (again) to the fact that work are visiting her to see how they can help her get back to work but that her real state at the moment isn’t anywhere near that.

From the outside, even to family and friends, kp appears to be the old kp. But, as the OT said, if kp is out of a familiar environment, she would struggle to cope with it, giving the example of a trip to the Metro Centre. kp would struggle to find a shop, and when she got to the shop, she would struggle to find the item she was looking for. When the OT said this, kp rememebered a situation from her Dalton Park (her trip with vdfromboro), where vd knew where they were, but kp was lost in the midst of all the shops.

So, the plan ………….

Next week, the OT is going to take kp shopping, but unlike “hubby” who would lead the expedition, kp has to be the decision maker, she has to pick a car park space for the OT to park in, remember it, remember the car they drove in (the OT’s), remember to pay for a ticket, etc etc etc….It should be really good for kp. The only way kp is going to get better is to tax her brain.

When the OT had gone, kp went straight to bed.

kp:- I need to get out of here.

So, not a good day today. She has decided not to go to court tomorrow – thanks Mum for your advice on this. I think it is for the best that she doesn’t go. I can report back all she needs to know.

kp is up from her sleep as I type this and is about to make a chicken bake (with my help of course).

That’s it for today..

PS – kp received a blog comment from “Mandy” the other day. She doesn’t know which Mandy this is. Mandy, please could you leave another blog comment saying which Mandy you are. Thanks

When kp got up from her snooze, we went outside for a cup of tea and a natter and kp got upset again.

kp (crying) :- “I feel like I am a thicko”

I tried to explain that she was just as intelligent as she was pre-accident and that she was still the kp we all know and love. I also tried to put into perspective her impairments.

dp :- All it means, love, is that you can’t take information in as quick as you used to…etc etc…

I also said…..

dp :- I tell you what, love. If you had to have a stroke, then I am glad we got the stroke we did. You could have been unable to speak, needing your food mashed up etc etc….

We got the tears under control.

For dinner, I made a shepherd’s pie (well, more like, warmed up a shepherd’s pie) and as I prepared this, Karen prepared a chicken bake for Thursday’s tea. I stood back as much as I could and let her do most of it.

Notice she can still multitask like only women can do (apparently)…..

Speaking on phone and doing chicken bake

Just a quick blog entry to let people know the result of the case against the driver.

He got given

• 4 months custodial sentence suspended for 2 years
• 300 hours community service
• 3 year driving ban
• Has to resit an extended driving test after 3 years
• Pay £100 Court Costs

More details to follow in the full blog entry later.

The sentencing at court today was on my mind all night and I had a bad night’s sleep. kp slept very well. I got up at 5am, sick of just lying awake in bed. Unusually, kp was up early as well, and we had breakfast at around 8am.

kp went back to bed as I went off to court, with Michelle, Freddy and Adele due to arrive at 11am to look after kp when she woke up.

I have only ever been in Crown Court before, so was interested to see what Magistrates Court was like. Not that impressive. A small square room, 3 magistrates at the front, and about 7 or 8 other court people (including the solicitors dotted around). There were only 5 seats for the public, so Angela, hubby and I shared 2 seats between the 3 of us.

Angela’s uncle attended and being a policeman he knew how these things worked and sorted out some time with us with the prosecuting solicitor so we could get across to him what all the injuries were. A good move.

There were a couple of cases before ours and they were in and out within 5 minutes. Sounded like a criminal damage and a skally who was banned from the Metro Centre.

Our case kicked off right on time at about 10.30am. Here is the order of play…..

The chap was called in to the court and he looked ghostly. Never seen such a shade of grey

It started with the crown prosecution solicitor stating the facts of the accident. He went in to the extent of damage, upset, police time and injuries caused. It was quite stirring when Kevin, Angela and Karen’s injuries were read out. I think kp would have got upset at that point. This lasted about 10 minutes. At some point, our chap made reference to the fact Angela was in court. The defendant never looked back AT ALL throughout the whole thing.

It was then the turn of the defendants solicitor. He submitted letters of reference from his doctor, another magistrate and some other party. The magistrates retired to read these through for about 10 minutes. In that time, another case was heard.

When they returned, the defendant’s solicitor stated his side of things. To be fair, he acknowledged the severity of the case, but he did say it could happen to any of us. One thing he said slapped Angela and I across the face, namely…….

Defendant’s solicitor :- Dangerous Driving has many levels of “dangerous”. This case has to be one of the lesser forms of Dangerous Driving. The defendant hadn’t stolen the car, he wasn’t evading police etc etc….

Of course, he had a point, but it still was a bit of a slap.

When he had made his case, he submitted pre-sentence reports stating how the defendant was a broken man, suffering from depression. He had a completely clean driving licence and basically was a model citizen apart from this.

The magistrates then retired again to work out what they were going to do. They were gone a LONG time (45 mins), apparently quite unusual, for magistrates court according to the defendant’s solicitor. I was pleased they were taking so long over it, instead of just writing it off. I would like to think our presence in the court probably made them think of the importance of the whole thing to us.

The result was read out by the middle magistrates and is listed in the previous blog entry.

kp is numb to the whole thing and seems very subdued tonight. I suspect it will take her a while to digest today and if there are tears, knowing kp, they will come in a day or so. She was due to go out for a meal tonight with Sue (ex work colleague), but we cancelled. Sue was very understanding.

When I got home from the court, I told kp all about it. Michelle and co still hadn’t arrived. I think they got here about 30 minutes after I arrived. Michelle brought lunch which was nice.

Lovely bread, Ham, Pies, Eclairs.

We had a nice lunch together, but then kp had to go to bed, and because of my early start, I was more than happy to go with her. We felt very guilty leaving all our guests, but sleep definately beckoned.

Interesting Day, leaving a very subdued kp.

I’ll leave today’s blog entry with a funny photo. Louisa (2) saw me eating a ham and mustard sandwich and said she wanted some of what I was eating (pointing at the mustard).

I was happy to oblige and put a tiny bit on a piece of bread. The result was a strange face with mustard pasted bread fully visible……..

And a nice bit of chewed bread and mustard being spat out subsequently.

kp got up about 12pm, giving her just enough time to get ready for her visitors at 1pm. Steph and Debbie arrived on time, bearing cakes and choccies Thanks girls.

We had a lovely chat with them, with a lunch of toasted sandwiches and steph’s cake

I took a photo after we had scoffed….

Debbie, Steph and kp.

Debbie complained that she had no makeup on, so I told her not to worry, I would sort that later !!!

Snooze in the afternoon. kp’s chicken bake tonight. May the Lord protect us !

A better day today.

Well, the coat hanger (being sold for charity) has raised £16 for Marrow Transplant 2000

kp woke up from her snooze, feeling very subdued, hardly speaking. She has gone back to bed at 7.45pm, after being up an hour.

Hopefully, she will feel better when she wakes up.

Because of kp’s big sleep yesterday, I couldn’t stay up as late as her and retired about 12am. kp didn’t come to bed until 3am !!

Adele came to do our cleaning at about 12pm and got well stuck in. kp got up when she arrived, and had a shower. I wanted to say “quick shower”, but they are a thing of the past. Hairdressers at 1pm.

Pain seems to be in control at the moment and she hasn’t needed any special dp ralgex rubs.

On returning from the hairdressers, kp said she couldn’t be bothered to have the usual banter with the ladies in there. I think she is still a bit flat, but I sense an upward mood swing coming.

We popped in at the charity shop on the way home, as I wanted a dog walking coat. £4 – A real bargain. Although I am sure Marie would have got £3 knocked off that, and got them to throw 2 in for the price of 1 as well.

Here’s kp’s new look hair doo. Another style to get used to – yippee !

I am starting to work on “Karen Pollard’s Biggest Challenge” – the book version. kp is due to start reading the blog 1 year after the accident (27th April 2005) and I want to have it in book format by then. By that, I mean that it will be readable from front to back. At the moment, if you wanted to read the blog from the beginning, you have to read it in a disjointed fashion. In preparation for this, I am fleshing out the first 2/3 weeks. The first 2 weeks were so touch and go that I didn’t have the wherewithall to write blog entries, so I have only brief entries for these first couple of weeks. I am sifting through Karen’s medical records from the hospital and conferring with friends and family to make the first 2 weeks more of a fuller read, so hopefully kp will know how bleak things were in the first few weeks.

I hope to make the new blog book version available on the web for anyone else who wants to reminisce or relive it.

Here’s me sifting through Karen’s medical records. This pile represents about half the records…..

Chicken Bake tonight as we skipped it last night – kp didn’t eat at all.

PS – John Brundle – great to hear from you. You’re welcome to visit, but we understand the time a 2 1/2 year old takes up. If you want to arrange to pop through (with or without child/wife, we are easy), then give me a ring on my mobile if you still have the number or you can email me. We’d love to see you again !