Here’s the story:

Three days after Peter’s forty-first birthday, on May 16, 2006, his life was changed forever by a rollover accident.  He stands 6-foot tall, strong, hardworking, full of joy and a zest for life that made it easy for him to have lots of friends.  He put the fun in any gathering; his gifts of humor and optimism made him welcome and well loved, always and everywhere.  He could charm people into loving him, sometimes in spite of themselves.  He is blessed with a spirit of generosity, always there to help, to solve a problem, to rescue, especially tall, preferably blond females.  Pete was the guy to call.  His passion is his music.  He was a keyboard artist, smooth jazz the music of choice, a composer and dynamic performer bringing his humor, energy and vitality to the stage.  He paid the rent from a lifelong career in carpentry.  He was fiercely independent.  Who could afford health insurance or workman’s compensation insurance? The truck insurance was about all he could manage.  Like the houses he worked on, he renovated and rebuilt that beloved, 23-year-old Toyota pickup, afraid of managing a car loan for a new one.  Let me help you, Pete, said Mom.  No, no – I’ll take care of it….

He suffered a traumatic brain injury, was in a coma for 3 weeks and woke up with a cervical break, a couple of broken ribs, a tracheotomy, a nasty case of pneumonia, paralysis, and a peg for tube feeding.  However, within a few days, he was alert, bright, and with his total personality, sense of humor and optimism in tact. He continued to charm everyone who came into his life.  His brain did not swell, the bleeding was absorbed, and he was diagnosed with diffuse axonal shearing. It was not a spinal cord injury.   Nothing could be done  – no surgery could solve the problem.  There was nothing to do but manage the lungs and wait for his brain to make new connections.  The connections he needs are those to enable him to swallow and move his arms, legs, hands and fingers, to speak.

He is a straight Medicaid patient; he does not qualify for disability; he gets $30 a month SSI while he is institutionalized.  Florida Medicaid will not pay for rehabilitative therapies.  The question is always, how can he improve without these vital therapies and exercises?  We could not allow him to slowly but surely lose all of his strength and have his muscles atrophy.

Thus began years of struggle to help him improve.  He has suffered through multiple illnesses and infections, despair and depression.  But angels walk along with us and work to heal him and solve problems.  We have many stories to tell.

We have privately provided therapies to help him improve, therapies which have been invaluable.  He is miraculously medically stable  and lives for his time in the therapy sessions.  Dr George Rozelle at his Neurotherapy clinic in Sarasota called Mindspa provides a fascinating electronic neuro/biofeedback therapy twice a week.  For a number of years we used the services of Aaron Maates and his therapists for Active Isolated Stretching, a method that has kept him from reverting to a fetal position.  However, most recently we have found that exercise therapy with physical trainers who know what they are about have provided the most benefit.  He sees these therapists twice a week and we installed a mirror in his room at the nursing home so that he can practice when he sits alone.  So now he is able to move slightly, hit a call button for help , pick his arms up onto the armrests of his wheelchair, pick up his feet and try to kick the cat. (when he is in our house) and even is beginning to raise an arm high enough to rub an itchy nose!

He still has a trach and a feeding tube, and we added a super pubic tube to solve bladder problems.  He has severe foot drop and may have to have surgery to correct it since all other methods of combating that problem have not worked. The jury is out on the next step. Through it all, his sense of humor saves the day.

We have a web site on www.caringbridge.org/visit/peterfulves where I keep a journal with updates on his situation..

Some of his old friends from New York and New Jersey  from the music business are planning a fundraiser to help with these therapy expenses and the financial burden of providing what Medicaid doesn’t cover.  It is being planned for sometime in October.  The plan is to provide lots of music, prize drawings and silent auction prizes.  We are searching for a venue and for donations for the silent auction and prize drawings.  If anybody has any ideas and can help in any way please contact me at Georgianals@verizon.net.  We are really looking forward to this.!  Wouldn’t it be great if I could manage to get him up to NJ for the event without losing his bed in the nursing home?!?!

Please join all of the angels, seen and unseen, who walk with us!

Please visit: http://www.caringbridge.org/visit/peterfulves