Reflections from my rehab bed 3 years ago!

I plan to write a few reflections from my time in the Rehab
centre in Dunedin, I am now in a place where my emotions are
strong & my head in a clear space to write about ? days!
When I was in ICU' for just over 3 weeks, I was on a life support
unit, tubes were in my nose, in my throat & also lower down in my
chest! My mouth was swollen along with my tongue & I was not
allowed any water & that was the case for almost 3 months due to
the swelling in my mouth and then skin came off the lining of my
mouth & also my tongue! I used to plead for water via a pad & pen
to the nursing staff. Every time I did this they would squab my
mouth out with a totally discusting liquid to help with reducing
the swelling. I used to try & fight as hard as I could to stop
them doing this & I ended up with my only good arm tied to the
bed, also to prevent me from pulling tubes out of my throat. At
that stage my left arm was paralysed. In my mind I used to
travel to every place I knew in New Zealand that I had been to
where I could get fresh, crystal clear water from! My thirst for
water was right out there! When I reached the spot in my mind &
tryed to drink from the spring, stream, pool, lake, etc I could
feel the water with my body but couldn't drink it at all! I
wouldn't linger at the place long be move on to another place in
the hope of quenching my thirst! I became so obseeded with
drinking water that when I was moved to the rehab centre I used
to ask the staff & my wife if the boxes of bottled water that I
had ordered from Lake Tekapo had arrived & I even had a date for
when the order was placed. You have no id, what a priviledge it
is to go to a tap & pour yourself a glass of water or to kneel at
a crystal clear pool of water & drink from it! As I am writting,
I have reached for my water bottle in my bag on the back of my
chair and taken a good mouthful!
in Life we strive to often full thelongings in our soul for
happyness & peace & we often will go to great lengths to achieve
this & work extended hours so as to hopefully achieve this goal!
In the good book the BIble it talks about GOd giving us water
that will quench that thirst in our souls & it is everlasting
water, so we will never thist again! He also says that He has
come to give us life & give it to us in abundance, that thirst
you have to find the meaning of life & to have peace,& fulfilment
& the struggggle to be someone that you are not called to ;, this
can only be satisfyed & quenched through coming to know our
Heavenly Father & His Son the Lord Jesus. "Whoever drinks of
this living water, will never thirst again" Jesus ws

Updating my progress

Hi every one,
Well this past week my Physio took me from the GYM' with the
walker down the wheelchair ramp & then she got me to climb a
flight of stairs. There was a total of 5 steps & with a little
bit of help from her I climbed the flight by myself and grabbed
my walker again at the top and then back down the ramp again!
From there I walked to shower with the brakes off on the walker,
a distance of about 50 metres!
Yesterday a couple of friend's came to walk with me & I walked
for close to an hour around the complex at Laura Fergusson with
the brakes off for must of the time, at one point, I was going
carefully over a speed bump & I glanced over to my right & would
you believe it, a snail was about to over take me & he stopped,
tipped his hat to me & said, "Good day to you Sir" & then cruised
on! I couldn't believe it, the check of others that share this
planet with us!
In the afternoon yesterday, I had a go at the treadmill again & I
managed to do a total of 40 minutes with a stop once at 31
minutes for a rest! With both lots of walking yesterday, I did
close to 1 KM' of walking!Th is a guy that this time 3 years ago
was laying on a bed in a rehab centre in Dunedin with a paralysed
left arm and paralysed from the waist down! God is truely a great
God!!!! Thank you also to all the amazing work that Laura
Fergusson staff do with me, the Blind Foundation, my amazing,
amazing family & amazing friend's, one family in particular! The
dream of getting back on my feet again is now turning into
reality & it is very, very awesome! For me the dream of getting
back on my feet again doesn't stop there, the sky is the limit as
to what can be achieved!

Heart felt thanks fo you all out there.

I don’t know where to start when it comes to saying thak you toall of you out there that have supported us in so many ways and continue to do so. It is truly very humvbling vbeing on the receiving end of such amzing generoudity and love, prayers, lind deeds, shoulders to lean on and much much more.You have no idea how much this amazing project re the mew house about to be built means to us as a family, this is a total dream coming true and for me personally to vbe avble to live with my own family and contribute to daily life is awesome as challenging as it is as well. v

Update on life as I know if now.

Hi everyone out there,,

Just an update on life as I know it now.

My day usually starts around 7v.00 am of earlier depending on keen I am to get up earlier and do some exercises. I usually leave the house at around 8.00 with a caregiver from Laura Fergusson and come a cross to the community where I have my breakie, which I now look after myself and cleanup as well, I make my own coffee of hot choice depending on my taste for the day. Following this I usually have free time for an hour of so and I often do emails of read a devotional for the morning and then I am of to the GYM for an hour or so. In the GYM I do a range of exercises, work at the wall bars, at the parallel vbars, on the treadmill, walking with the walker, weights, etc and then I have a shower and lunch. In the afternoon I do arrange of activvitiws, computer tuition, ADL programme which is Adaptive Daily Living with an instructor from the Blind Foundation, swimming at a local pool with a swimming instructoe and then a soak in the spa,catch up with residents from Laura Fergusson from time to time, cruise and enjoy a great coffee, Mum comes and hangs out with me for an afternoon and yesterfay we planted our gardens at home with veges and other stuff ready for summer, can’t beat the good home grown produce and we have enjoyed some good crops from the garden in the past. I usually stay at Laura Fergusson for my dinner and then my family come for me at around 7.00pm and we are off home, the evenings are spent doing computer stuff, hwlping the kids with homework vvia my Braillenote unit which has a keyboard I can attach and a conversation can behad with me and I read of the Braille display, also helps the kids with their keyboarding skills as well, help with a few household chores, stretches and exercises at times and then off to noddy land.

I believe that life is for living and I am endeavouring to enjoy every day as much as I can and believing for great things to happen as we journey into the future, in saying that, I also believe that if you don’t set goals and activvvely work towards them and also reassess where you are at with them, you wil end up a few months years down the track in the same place that you were anddoing the same old same old, I refer back to my motivational statement I posted earlier in my Blog, To achieve great things, you not only have to act but also dream, you not only have to plan but also vbelieve.

To all of you out there that have so amazingly supported us up till now thank you from the bottom of my heart.

Hi all

I’ve signed up as an online collector for Blind Week to help make a difference to more than 11,500 blind and partially sighted New Zealanders.

The Royal New Zealand Foundation of the Blind (RNZFB) provides life-changing services for its members, yet less than one third of what it does is funded by government sources.

Please join me helping to support the RNZFB this Blind Week by donating to my collection.

Just click on the link below  - any help is appreciated but be quick donations need to be in by November 6^th!

            http://mybucket.rnzfb.org.nz/collect/philthorncollection

Thank you & God Bless

Phil