Keep this girl in your prayers, please.

Thank you guys for the kind words.

 

Jaci's gearing up for school Monday. She is excited but at the same time nervous. Her parents met with school officials sometime this week. To make a long story short, whatever Jaci wants/needs, she will get. They want to make it as easy as possible for Jaci to make it through a day. We hope that days go (for the most part) easy for her, and we also hope when things start going downhill, she has the courage to say "enough, I need a break". Fortunately, our school is accessible to her. Wherever there are steps, there is a ramp nearby.

In other news, Jaci was chosen as a recipient of the Joey Wilkerson Foundation award. Joey is a paraplegic, and every year he raises money for people with similar injuries. Jaci will be receiving a $15,000 donation along with a new bed. Her mom was talking to Joey earlier this week about some of Jaci's needs, one of which was a bed that would cost a few K's. Joey said "don't worry, I have it covered". He had the bed that was mentioned, waiting for a recipient that really needed it. It was delivered this morning.

 

Today was back to school for all of us youngsters. Jaci gets there later than normal time, and gets to leave early. Me and a few other friends got to spend about 30 minutes with her this morning. She was all smiles, and all of us enjoyed being around her. And she looked great too!

 

Thank you guys. I have the same thoughts as well, with school. She's very happy to see ALL of her friends almost each and every day.

Last weeks issue of the local paper here has her on the front page.

I agree. 3/4 of my lawn is dead grass!

EDIT-picture of the front page will have to wait. Can't get Tapatalk to upload.

 

This is the picture I tried to upload earlier.
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Thanks guys for the kind words.

I agree, her progress has been incredible, and nothing short of that. And yes, she does indeed have a ton of spirit. Last softball season, win or lose, on the field or in the dugout, she had spirit there with her. Never left for a split second. When the team lost, she would always have something to say that would make the team laugh and cheer them up a bit.


Today, she wasn't at school. At first, I thought it was therapy, but I remembered that she only misses her last 2 periods in the afternoon (I usually see her in the morning around 11) for 3 days a week. She also gets here about an hour or so later I think. Not sure why she wasn't there, but I sure hope she's feeling okay.

 

Jaci was back at school today. I asked her where she was yesterday, and she told me she decided to take a day off. She said it consisted of sleeping and going to her therapy. I also asked her how her week is going and she responded with "pretty good".

Today, I took note of something...how she uses her iPhone. Jaci as of now has VERY limited use of her hands. She gets one wrist under it, raises it up, and then uses the other wrist (or other part of her hand) to click the On/Off button on the top. When the "Slide to Unlock" screen comes up, she uses her knuckles to slide the arrow to the right. She then uses her knuckles to open things, scroll, press the Home button, and sometimes type. Even though she needs to use her stylis to help her type, I think she's getting better at typing without it. She's just not going to let her limitations bring her down!

 

Jaci's first week of school went smooth for the most part. She was glad to be back around her friends. Yesterday was picture day and she was really dressed up and pretty!

Though, unfortunately, I got transferred to a new school Tuesday. Updates may not come as often.

Last Saturday, I went to the Rangers game. I was in the gift shop at the home plate entrance looking at their collectibles (cards, penants, etc.), when I looked up and noticed these boxes. I asked someone to get one down, and looked at it. It was a memory box, with the Rangers logo on the lid, and a unique design of ticket stubs from the first few Rangers games to the 2010 World Series all over the box. I thought Jaci would love it, and got one for her.

On Monday, I gave it to her. She had a smile on her face when she saw it. She couldn't put it in her bag (I could barely get it into my Ferrari drawstring bag), so she had to have it in her lap. Fortunately, she was leaving about 15 minutes later for therapy, so she didn't have to carry it around all day like that.

But, it's great to see her enjoying school.

 

Thanks for the kind words. I'll try to keep them coming as often as I can.

 

Not much to say here. School is still going smooth for Jaci. Therapy is going good too.

Sunday, she's going to the Rangers game. She had 18 (yes, you read that right) suite tickets donated to her family by I believe Nolan Ryan.

 

Thank you guys.

James, you're welcome. A big support base would be with anyone who had something bad to them, just like Jaci. She was even brought up today at ICF.

I'll try and keep updates coming as soon as I get them, but I think it would get repetitive if I just kept posting her normal daily routine of school and therapy. Though, I did find this interesting...how she does some of her schoolwork.

For math, she will do her work on a drawing app on her iPad, then she will have a friend put that on her paper. I think it's how she does work for every class, and the teachers are fine with it. School is going great for the most part, but at the same time, is exhausting for her. For 3 days a week, she leaves early to go to Harris in Fort Worth to do her therapy. Then she has to get caught up on work she missed, on top of her therapists pushing her pretty hard. It's just exhausting her, but she's a tough girl and seems to manage.

 

Jaci had a great time at the Rangers game today. She definitely enjoyed the game (especially Adrian Beltre hitting 2 homers and our friend CJ having a solid performance). She also got to see a special pre-game in commemoration of 9/11.

Afterwards, she got the treat of a lifetime...she got to go into the Rangers lockerroom and wait for them! She had a talk with several different players and staff, including Mitch Moreland, David Murphy, Matt Treanor, Ron Washington, and Nolan Ryan. David gave her an autographed ball that was used in todays game.

It was Gary Simpson (not Nolan) that donated these tickets to her.

Attached are two pictures her dad uploaded to Facebook. First one is with Ron, the second is with David.
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Jaci has been doing great as of lately. She has been missing school occaisonally because she is either worn out or not feeling well, but she gets caught up on her work. Here are a few of the things she has done over the past few weeks:

-At therapy, she was able to transfer herself from her wheelchair to a mat for therapy. It took her about 30 minutes but she did it. And she did it with all arm strength too. 6 months ago, she was a strong person, and as you know has lost strength, but she's determined enough to get that strength back; every bit of it. Also, when she was done, she was able to transfer back to her wheelchair on her own.
-That same night, she bathed herself for the first time on her own. Her mom brought her a bath mit and she bathed herself. She was able to wash her face with a scrubber thing.
-She brushed her teeth with an electric tooth brush. She placed it in her hand, got it to her mouth, and used her other hand to hold her arm up. A bit messy, but she did it.
-She can almost eat anything without aid, mostly solids that you hold and eat with a fork. When she ate a snowcone once, she had no problems eating it with a spoon, but when she got to a certain point, she would use her finger nail to cut around the foam cup and make the cup smaller.
-Friday night, she attended her first football game since the accident. She almost didn't make it. The overwhelming fear of so many people and having to be pushed through them made her extremely anxious. She paused, took her time, shed a few tears, and decided no time was better than the present. She went to the endzone and watched the game. Despite that, I think she had a good time. Hopefully, each time will get a bit easier.
-Saturday night, her and a few of her friends drove around for a bit, just having fun, talking and laughing.

It must be satisfying to her that she is feeling a bit more independent. On Tuesday, people are coming to her house to do pressure mapping. They will map all of the spots on her body that are pressure spots. I don't know what happens when this is complete, but we know the spots will be sensitive when sitting or laying.

She is probably one of the Rangers' biggest fans right now. She (along with me and alot of other people) was watching this time last year when they went to the World Series. If they win this year, I can imagine that would make her extremely happy that not only they won, but to have 2 of her favorite teams win titles in one year. Like me, she was extremely pumped for these first 2 games against Tampa.


I'll leave you guys with this, a quote from Jaci herself.