Stanford Strong

 July 31, 2022 Happy 23 years @chrisstanford9 ! Although it hasn’t been a year of celebration, we can celebrate that we are both still standing strong together. I read that the couples that are meant to be are the ones who go through everything that’s designed to tear them apart and come out even stronger. Love you and hopefully by year 24 life will be full of achievements and advances in medicine. That is my biggest prayer for our anniversary!

 July 20, 2022 The hold on the study that we moved up for has been lifted!!!! We are so excited although he has also been getting awesome PT/OT while we waited. Now we begin a few week of assessments before the actual study will begin. So this is an upper extremity study looking at the effects of transcutaneous spinal stimulation in conjunction with activity based physical training. The study is randomized into 3 groups which we won’t know until the therapy actually begins. In any group he will get 60 sessions of physical therapy and the only difference is the quality of those sessions with the spinal stimulation. Today julian was hooked up to electrodes and the spine was stimulated at different levels to see at which frequency elicited a muscle contraction. (I think I’m explaining all right, I’m learning that the neuro system is amazing. I’ve always thought the human body was incredible with what it’s capable of. I’ve always seen this through an OB set of eyes but the neuro s

 July 8, 2022 Not sure where to start.  Julian and I have been in Kentucky for 5 weeks and every Friday we get the schedule for the following week.  I feel like we are pins and needles waiting for something good to happen.  Ever since Julian's injury, I feel like we are kicking and screaming, or crawling and begging for what we believe is the next best thing.  Nothing about Spinal cord injury has been easy.  First, there aren't many SCI's a year, and not everyone is versed on how to treat.  Yes, neurosurgeons can fix the break and repair the bones that have been compressed.  The harder part of the equation is how much of the spinal cord has been compressed preventing neurotransmission from occuring from the brain to the different parts of the body.  This has been the elusive piece of the pie that for decades they have been trying to figure out how to bridge the connection.  It's been explained as a car accident on a high way, and not being able to pass through.  How do

 July 6, 2022 We made our first trip home since being in Kentucky.  Julian had last Friday off of therapy and closed on Monday July 4th.  May May flew up to drive down with us.  We loved being back to see Chris, Alex and Lilly.  We got to see some friends and went to Ft. Jackson for a independence day fireworks.  Being home was great and hopefully recharge for the weeks to come.  Alex and Lilly are getting ready to go to Disney with May May and Pop.  PaPa drove up to Kentucky with us and got to see where we are living,  Now its back to work for Julian.  He leaves tired and sweaty.  Now to try to figure out some care giver solutions so that I can balance being a mom to all 3 of my kids.