Day 195 - Wednesday 9th November

H - 1 (Home minus 1) and counting.

Karen was asleep when I arrived, but was soon gabbing like a good 'un. She is so excited to be coming home. Karen NEVER gets excited. She is known for it in the family. So, tomorrow must be something very very special to her for her to show any signs of excitement.

We started the day by writing a few cards out to the hospital staff. Karen had done a poem for the staff and it needed writing out onto the card.

Cards done, we went for a bath. I ran it, took kp in, got her in her birthday suit and then kp noticed the bath temperature wasn't right. It was 25'C. It had been filled with cold water only. There was no hot water on the ward. So, I got her half decent again and we went back to her room to wait for the hot water to be fixed.

Whilst we waited for hot water, I started taking down the remainder of cards from kp's walls. Marie had done most of it a week or so back.

The hot water was sorted in no time.

Bath over, we went for some lunch at Quenellies.

Karen was so talkative today. We kept reminiscing about the times when she stood up for the first time, the time she went outside for the first time etc....etc....

I told her how proud of her I was. She still didn't shut up and I loved every minute of it.

It is so refreshing and lovely to see kp excited about something.

In Physio today, the main man basically asked kp what would she like him to do. She wanted her arms to be loosened up a bit, as they were painful when she moved them to certain area.

This reminds me of a funny thing from yesterday. Each day, kp and I do some exercises for kp's left arm. Well, kp does them, I just tell her to do them.

As a new one, I told her to touch her nose with her left hand. Well, the funniest thing happened.

kp thrust her hand in the air as fast as she could, realised it was going to reach her nose, and so pushed her head down as fast as possible to see if it would meet the nose halfway. Yes, cheating by anyone else's standards, but sheer genious. They didn't meet halfway unfortunately, but 10/10 for effort.

kp was laughing at herself, for what she had done. I asked her why does she move her arm so fast. She explained that she can only get it that high if she gets it going fast, as it just runs out of steam. She basically banks on the momentum it has with speed to carry it that much further.

It's good that we can smile at this kind of thing. I had kp in stitches the other day, doing an impression of her when she has just woken up and she is walking to the loo. It basically involves small bitty steps to start off with, as she tries to encourage her left leg to kick into action and do a "full" stride. The impression is funnier than the description.

I went home about 3pm today to prepare for the Queen's homecoming. Marie stayed on.

Whilst I was away, kp's consultant came in to say his goodbyes and wish her all the best. That was nice of him. Lovely bloke.

When I returned to the hospital at 8pm to pick Marie up, she told me that kp had been to the loo SIX times since I had been gone. She put it down to kp's excitement.

We left kp for the last time at the hospital, packing pretty much everything (apart from kp) in the car.

We can't wait for tomorrow. When Marie and I got home, we carried on the preparations for tomorrow, and had completed them by about 11.15pm. Veronica is arriving at Durham station (from London) at 1.15am. Once I have picked her up and brought her back, it will be bedtime all round.