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June 28, 2005
June 28, 10:30 PM
asher wore his own clothes today for the first time since his fall. gloria brought a tee shirt that he had designed himself for his skate company, Roll Model. that is the name that he used for everything he did that was connected with inline agressive street skating, including all of the skating videos that he has made.
i can't tell you how great it was to see him wearing that shirt and shorts.
they put asher in a special wheel chair this morning that provides support for his head. almost as soon as they hoisted him in it he really seemed to come to life. for the next hour they let us push him all around the unit so that he could see where he was and who was around. finally, we parked him in the physical therapy room in a place where he could look out the window. after he spent some time looking i decided to see if he would respond to any commands. so, i asked him to stick out his tongue and he did it almost immediately. then i asked him to close his eyes and hold them. he did that almost as quickly, and not just once, but twice. next, because he was starting to make some noises and we were talking to him about home i decided to ask him to say "home." to our astonishment gloria and i both heard him say "home."
a few minutes later his speech therapist arrived in order to spend some time evaluating him. i left gloria there with him, because i didn't want to be another distraction for him. after i came back gloria said the speech therapist told her that asher did really well and scored very high in terms of the scale that she used to evaluate him. all we could say is thanks be to God for more answered prayers.
tomorrow i have to travel back to chattanooga and take care of some business for a few days. please pray that i will be able to get everything done that i need to and also, that gloria will be able to do what she needs to by herself while i am away. hadrienne will also be joining me in chattanooga on thursday and will return with me back to atlanta, probably on sunday. this sure does get complicated at times. i really hate having to leave gloria in atlanta by herself for so long, but we are moving into an apartment that the shepherd spinal center will be providing for us tomorrow and it is very close by, so this will be a temendous help.
today we met the wife of the man that is in the room next to asher's. she asked us to pray for her husband and i told her that i would put her request for prayer on asher's update tonight. his name is chris smith and he is 42 years old. he had a cardiac arrest 97 days ago and he is still in a coma from it. he has now been in the shephard brain injury unit for 3 weeks and his wife is trying to get their home ready so she can move him there. when he had his cardiac arrest, he had just been exercising. they think that some plaque from a 49% clogged artery he had broke lose and caused his heart to arrest. several co-workers gave him cpr, but they couldn't get his hearts rhythm going again, so they finally used a protable defibulator that was available. they said that before they used the paddles that he was dead for 5 minutes and lost a significant amount of oxygen to his brain and that is why he is now in a coma. he has a trach tube, like ashers and he has to be on a ventilator. please pray that God would perform a miracle and begin to wake chris up and to allow him to breathe on his own. he and his wife have a 13 year old daughter that i was also asked to mention for prayer as well. God has placed a great burden on my heart for this very hurting family and it is my prayer that he will give all of you a burden to pray for them as well. i will give you updates on him when there are any changes in his conditions.
i continue to be just so thankful for all of you. everything i am able to write day after day i believe are really just testimonies for all that God is doing as a result of all of your prayers.
with great joy, hope and thanksgiving,
andy mendonsa
| By Andy Mendonsa | 11:06 PM
