Small Improvements

While some days I yearn to see leaps and bounds in Brendan's progress, it is easiest to see the changes that have occurred over months of time, each happening slowly.  Sometimes I don't even notice the change until I look back and see how things used to be.

 Tonight Shaun asked me if I was carrying Brendan's "emergency bag."  (It's the orange carrying case I carry around with blue bags, fluids, syringes, tylenol, EMLA cream, and anything else we might need at a moments notice.)  I realized that I haven't carried it with me places for several weeks now.  We haven't used it for at least that long.  It's been longer than two weeks since Brendan last threw up. Even during the night it doesn't happen anymore.  And it used to be an almost nightly occurrence.

 I used to have to keep Brendan in sight or hearing all the time, but not anymore.  If his feeding pump alarm goes off, he can re-set it himself.  He can hook himself up to it or unhook it.  Brendan can even carry it up and down the stairs if he needs to (if he can't talk someone else into doing it for him.) Tonight he practically skipped up the stairs.  It reminded me that only a few months ago there was a time when he was too weak to even walk up stairs.

 Slowly Brendan is trying foods again.  So far crackers and chips have been the extent of his eating experimentation, but he said tonight that he could actually taste the sour cream and onion potato chips -- and that gives him great hope that other tastes will return soon as well.

We have almost forgotten that Brendan's saliva glands didn't work for a long time.  His mouth would get pasty and dry and he would always carry around a cup to spit into.  Swallowing was something he avoided at all cost.  Now, the saliva glands (the ones working) are compensating for the ones knocked out by radiation, and his mouth has returned to normal.  Which is also good for his teeth.

  The skin on Brendan's neck and shoulders is all healed up now.  There are only a few spots right behind his ears that show the skin "sunburn" damage that he had after radiation.  There are no more sores in his mouth or throat (although, thankfully, that was never much of a problem for him).  Brendan's nose used to be stuffy and run constantly.  We used to have boxes of tissues everywhere -- in the car, at the table, by his bed, and  in each room of the house.  And all of that sinus surgery work caused him to snore, or just snuffle, at night.  Now he breathes easily and noiselessly.

Most of these things changed so slowly that we didn't even notice when we didn't have to deal with them anymore.  Little by little things are changing for the better all the time.