Jennaishealed.org

Cooper and I have moved out of the inlaws’ house (finally, thank God), out here to a friend’s “farm” in Rosedale, IN.  It is a tiny little hamlet outside Terre Haute, and the house sits on nine acres of land.  It includes a gigantic backyard the size of a soccer field, a largish horseshoe-shaped pond at the bottom of a gentle hill (behind the soccer field), and a number of outbuildings.  My buddy has a ton of project cars and other fun stuff to do.  We can go shooting in the backyard since we are outside of city limits, there is a gas-powered golf cart to ride around on, among other things.

The house itself is this pretty big old farmhouse, and Jenna got to visit out here last weekend.  It was absolutely AWESOME to have her here. It was a wonderful, peaceful visit over the weekend.  It was a bit of a drag having to go get her on Friday, then take her right back on Sunday, but hopefully we can get longer home visits in the future.

Jenna did very, very well.  The only issue she had was trying (and failing) to remember the layout of the house.  Jaime (new housemate) had a ton of people over to help work on one of the project cars (1989 Helios Blue VW Jetta 16v identical to the one I had in Alabama, and was blasting the music out in the garage.  Jenna and I were sitting outside the garage listening to the music and just hanging out.  There were also a bunch of kids there, and a lot of other activity, all of which Jenna tolerated very very well.

We are going back to visit on Friday the 11th, and hopefully Carbondale isn’t hit in a 8th-anniversary attack.. Something tells me we’ll be safe in the middle of bumblef*ck southern Illy…

Not tomorrow, but soon.  Her birthday visit was awesome, and made it clear to everyone involved that it’s time to prepare for her return!  This is awesome news!!!

She still has some issues to work on, but the major reason why she was/is in the CCS facility was the fact that her bipolar condition blazed out of control after the brain injury.  I lived with this condition for three years, dealing with constantly recycling rages of anger and screaming, until it got to the point where I literally could not take it anymore.  I had been driven into the brinks of insanity myself, from which I thankfully recovered.  It took a good year+ to come back from the brink of hell but here I am.

Anyway the birthday visit was fantastic.  Just about everything is going as best as can be imagined, with minor hiccups along the way.  I am starting a business in addition to working in a not-for-profit law firm that helps people of modest means.  Right now I am just a mostly-unpaid intern but things should change by the end of this month, and I’ve branched out with a side business repairing broken iPods and laptop computers.

Cooper and I are going to see Jenna again next weekend and will be sure to love her as much as possible.  I tell Cooper that our #1 job is to love his mommy.  He is such a sweet little child.  Just an amazing kid.

More later!

Best part is I get to go get her and bring her back to Indy for five days.  Due to medicaid rules, she can’t be away from the facility for more than five days at a time, and only on special occasions like holidays and the like…Anyway, I’m cleared (from work) to go get her this coming Tuesday, then I have to have her back in Carbondale no later than Saturday at midnight (I’ll really have to have her there by bedtime which is about 9-10pm as her evening-time meds knock her out pretty fast, plus I gotta four-hour drive back to Indy that night).<p>Ima leave at about 4am Indy time to get there about when she should be waking up, then bring her back to Indy by about lunchtime or early afternoon anyway so that we have the rest of the day to hang with Cooper.  If I could rig his carseat to recline more so he could sleep in the car, id consider bringing him, but the car (1991 BMW 325i) is pretty small (and his seat is pretty huge) and there’s not much room as it is.I’m excited!

Ok.  Must. Update. More.Been for at least two more visits since last update.  She’s doing pretty well.  The time before the last time, I got there and she acted like I had never been there before.  She just didn’t remember me ever being there.  It was pretty disturbing to say the least since I’m there at least twice a month.  But she seemed to remember once I prompted her a little bit.Some parts of her memory seem to be improving.  She seems to remember the hotel room number better each time we stay in a new room.  Of course the room number changes each time but these last two times she seemed to have far less trouble remembering the number when she’d go out to have a smoke.OH GOD I WISH SHE COULD/WOULD STOP SMOKING!Everyone, and I mean EVERYONE smokes at her little apartment house, staff and other patients, so it would be extremely hard for her to stop while she is living there.  I’d say impossible, knowing Jenna’s personality.My mom is here in town and we went to visit Jenna for a long weekend over the Fourth holiday, and we had an awesome time with Cooper.  We went to chuck-e-cheese, saw a lot of fireworks (midwesterners KNOW how to blow stuff up!) and overall had a great time.She had a couple of mild “outbursts” but nothing serious, like it used to be.  More later!

Went for a quick visit today with Cooper and Jenna’s parents.  Bittersweet as I immediately began missing her as soon as we left.  It would almost be better not to go than to go for such short visits.  Next week ill be going back for the weekend, without Cooper.  Time for some mommy-daddy alone time!