*Everyone's invited, but please don't share on social media.
R.S.V.P in the comments below:
February 27 Anytime between 4-8pm: The Knolls Clubhouse 3400 E Geddes Dr, Centennial, CO 80122
send your favorite picture of Erica to: erica@theunorthodoxy.com
In lieu of flowers, please consider a donation to the American Cancer Society
Hi. Please accept my deepest sympathies. I am so so very sorry.
I’m Erica’s friend from high school, Mare. We were also roommates in the first dumpy apartment we had after moving out of our parents homes.
She would have been about 18/19 in this picture, shortly after starting nursing school. I also included her senior picture because she looks so beautiful red headed, too.
The last couple months have been pretty good (as good as they could have been). Somehow she survived and mostly recovered from two horrific strokes, but cancer is insidious and always wins.
The last couple days have been awful. Saturday she stopped walking. Sunday she stopped eating/drinking. She's comfortable now and every now and then will open her eyes to find her family at her side. I don't know what else to say other than it breaks all of our hearts :(
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Excellent news everyone, Erica is being discharged tomorrow! We know many of you are anxious to see her, but for now, we’d like to keep it only family while she acclimates to being home (and a new home at that) until next week. We will let you all know when she is ready for in person visits and try to work out a schedule that doesn’t overwhelm her.
We also wanted to say that unvaccinated people can't visit her at this time - we hope you understand, given Erica’s immunocompromised state and the battle she has fought to get this far, the gravity of this request. For those of you who are vaccinated, we would ask you wear masks when you come.
With love and gratitude to you all for your help, prayers, kindness, and love, from the Bren, Hedlund, and Weitzlstrong family
]]>Or three weeks in, depending on how you look at things. The pragmatist [1] would say we're at week three.
Anyways, because she's strong and able she's been deemed a fall risk and bought herself a 24 hour sitter. Which is pretty awesome because it's way better than the one visitor/day policy. Yay! The last few nights I've curled up in bed with her and she's sleeping great.
She passed her swallowing eval so now she can have unthickened water and [mostly] real food. Win! She's up and about, can walk the entire hall unassisted and her discharge date is set of 11/21. Pretty remarkable for a stroke as big as hers.
Neurologically she's the Erica we all know and love. This morning we were going through this site through all the events that led to today and she knows what happened. She also knows all of you who posted comments. It's pretty sweet.
I wanted a picture to post here because she looks amazing, but she's a little hesitant. But since every day has been better than the last it's only a matter of time. Soon... :)
[1] - an adage where the optimist says it's half full and the pessimist says it's half empty. The engineer says the glass is twice as big as it needs to be.
]]>I stopped in to see her and she was just getting out of the shower. My mother gave her a haircut yesterday, and she looks great. We're off to the surgeon's office later this morning to get the stitches out. Yay!
Everything's looking up today. Yay! I mentioned that it was her mother's Birthday and she said "oh shit..." I think she was supposed to have a card in the mail by now.
]]>The kids and I swung by and peeked in the window and the way to school, she smiled, waved, and blew kisses. yay. I came back and she was in OT cruising the halls and we hung out for a while. She's really intact and although her short-term memory isn't quite there, she does remember things from the day of her stroke, so that's promising.
She remembers (and is excited) about the costco couch her and my mother found. She's excited that I got the last one. But all morning she kept saying "It's so weird.." And understands she's had a stroke and her mind isn't quite right.
Her care team meets sometime today to have conference and will have a plan afterwards, so we'll know more then.
p.s. I told her about last weekend and how everyone showed up to help pack and she broke down. She knows you love her.
]]>There were some concerns the last few days about a possible infection because Erica had a slightly elevated fever, but after chest x-rays and other tests, she’s all good on that front. She’s had a very busy schedule between OT, PT, and SLP the last few days and she’s always very tired at the end of the day (or really about 3 – 4pm), but she’s also showing lots of improvement. Bryon sat with her today, and we came to the window to say hi – we made some funny faces and smooshed our faces against the glass, and she laughed and then she threw her arm over the side of the bed and pulled herself right up to a sitting position! Which immediately set off the bed alarm, so apparently, she’s been trying to get up and about over the last 24 hours. Her short-term memory is still not great, but she is otherwise more alert, aware, and awake every day.
She loves seeing people through the window (she blew me and my husband lots of kisses today, and was clearly very happy to see us, or maybe it was because Bryon had just gotten in the room too), but her PT/OT/SLP schedule changes every day, and although we usually know what it will be the day before, it could change the day of they’ve told us. The sitter schedule changes every day too (we’re currently rotating between myself, Kathy, and Bryon), and when she gets too tired to really interact with people changes too, so it’s kind of hard to say when a good time for a window visit might be most unfortunately
Bryon is planning to start having movers get the furniture from the old house to the new on Friday, and we are looking forward to seeing some of you on Saturday for the cleaning party – come any time after 12pm!