Journey

Rory has finally been able to get stage two of his Ta moko completed.  Sean took him to Auckland where Rani https://mokokauri.co.nz/ was the visiting artist in a tattoo studio.  Rory dug deep to cope with the two hours of tattooing, which at times was painful.  It is healing well and is quite impressive.  Rani described stage two as a reflection of life moving on.  Thank you to Cindy for accommodating the boys for the night. 

The powerchair trials continue.  This week with Coralie we trialled the Vimo www.vimowheelchair.co.nz/ .  We are struggling to find two chairs which will cover the spectrum we need;  indoors (house, shopping centres), hybrid out in the community (kerbs, uneven and broken ground) and outdoors (fields, beach, tracks and trails).  The options are being constrained by Rory’s cognitive ability, slow processing speed, declining co-ordination due to ataxia and lack of fine motor skills.  He did enjoy, and coped quite well, on the NP walkway on a mobility scooter we borrowed from the Taranaki Disability Centre.  Rory has had a couple of sessions with new Support Carer Shelley.  She has replaced Jo to provide respite care for Sean and I one day per month on a weekend.  This enables Sean, Colt and I to go walk about in the wild which is the best therapy.  Where we can we couple this with overnight assistance from Sam and Caitlyn.  In the last three weeks we have tramped Pukeiti and Taramoukou Conservation Area.  Thankfully Peter has returned to NP Men’s Shed to teach and accompany Rory.  He is still recovering after his operation but doesn’t like being idle.  They are back into production making beautiful things from timber.  Rory has had a chest x-ray.  These are needed every six months to check for reoccurrence of osteosarcoma.  I have been particularly anxious about the result as he has a persistent intermittent cough.  We have been waiting a week for the result.