[Sandi.Alex]

My sister (age 51) fell out of a window and fracture her neck from c2 - c5. It has only been 3 months now and she can only move her right arm very little but can not move any other parts of her body. She is starting to have some feeling in her hands but can not move them. She is back at the hospital with a uti and is now waiting to find another bed for long term rehab. We have not gotten much information on recovery. Is the recovery a slow pace, do we hope that she will be able to move her upper body. She has a positive attitude that she will be able to walk. She does have a lot of spasms, is that normal. We just need some information. Thanks

[allis53ca]

PATIENCE...is the one thing you have to have...3 mos is very early to see anything wiith such a high injury..at 90 days, i still couldn't pick my nose..at 90 days i hjadn't been out of bed except for time to do tests, take an xray, etc...hadn't even been outside...hadn't even sat in a wheelchair....90 days is nothin......even if you'd judged my recovery at 6 months you'd been wrong...it was 6 months til i got in a chair the first time...i now live totally independent..........

PATIENCE ! sister too.......and keep coming back here

[Sandi.Alex]

allis53ca, on Dec 13 2009, 11:38 AM, said:

PATIENCE...is the one thing you have to have...3 mos is very early to see anything wiith such a high injury..at 90 days, i still couldn't pick my nose..at 90 days i hjadn't been out of bed except for time to do tests, take an xray, etc...hadn't even been outside...hadn't even sat in a wheelchair....90 days is nothin......even if you'd judged my recovery at 6 months you'd been wrong...it was 6 months til i got in a chair the first time...i now live totally independent..........

PATIENCE ! sister too.......and keep coming back here

What are you able to do on your own now and how long did it take? Thanks for the reply, I really appreciate it!

[Tetracyclone]

keep in mind each injury is different. you cannot know until you know.

[Ratticis]

Don't expect anything that way if you don't achieve what you wanted its not as depressing. That is not to say give up completly, just the opposite. Never stop trying and be grateful for every little bit as it comes and look back at how far she's come thus far. There is no magic formula that says 'anyone with this leval of injury can do this and this, but not that'. Like pwuff said, every injury is different. Patience is key. I was trapped in the hospital for a full year and a half before I finally got home. And since going home i've come even further. But there is never really an end to the recovery process. Don't mourn over what was lost, be ever grateful for what is still there, and for everything that is regained. Best of luck to you, your sister, and the rest of your family.

[Maltese Cat]

i just wanted to reiterate what ratticus said. I bet if you asked every single SCI person in this site whether they had recovered exactly to the degree that the doctors said they would, then you'd get almost zero saying yes. Doctors know a huge amount, but there is so much that is still not understood, especially about the nervous system, and predicting how an injured nervous system will recover is a bit like forecasting the weather.

So expect nothing, but strive for everything.

There are patterns of recovery, but it is easier to diagnose what level the injury is, and which parts (front, back centre etc) of the spinal cord it affects, from the type and degree of recovery, than it is to predict the recovery from what we can see from MRI images etc. about what the injury looks like.

A lot of people will say that what you have not got back within 18mo to 2 years, you will never get. But my boyfriend has a complete injury at L1, and even now, 6 years post accident, he is seeing improvements. (they are hard fought for and worked at improvements, they don't just appear by themselves, but if you keep on fighting, then you can keep on improving).