In Mount Sinai Waiting Room

Surgeries Board

Today, I sit in the waiting room of Mount Sinai Hospital, NYC glancing at the lighted board reminiscent of airport Departure times. This surgery is for getting Yuri’s voice back.

A Rescue Bird’s Tail For Telling

Pincio

Coming to someone’s rescue comes naturally to me. When Yuri, finally awake from his long springtime nap, wanted to get out of the hospital so desperately despite having atrophied muscles and a body attached to a roomful of machines and linked in tubes, I conspired along with him to enable his escape.

A Coming of Age Story

This medical ordeal aged us– physically, mentally, and emotionally. To find our way out of this Wilderness, we go to our favorite place for peace and solace and take a dip in the cold, clear water.

Caregiving Is Not Free

field of plants

It’s been the most unsettling time as I fell into the rabbit hole of primary caregiver during an intensive, and in those early weeks, an extremely dire situation that lasted for what seemed like an eternity

Heart of Gold

Hector Flamingo

Yuri’s brain (as chairman of the board), encouraging the rest of his players to heal synergistically with Western medicine and non-traditional therapies.

Summer Days Debriefing

Yuri on deck

I watch what Yuri accomplishes every day– the longer walks, taking the outside front steps, walking down the uneven riser steps to the lower level. These are challenges he was unable to do just a week ago.

Free At Last

I want to do my best for Yuri. He is, after all, the man in charge of his come back. That’s what Home Care Team kept saying about the vast improvements and recovery in one month of being home.

Tube B or Not Tube B or the Tube & I

Yuri typing

by Yuri Turchyn Coming home from Rehab felt like a triumph. The first two weeks were tough physically and mentally. Emotionally, it was heaven. It’s the Quiet that makes me content.

It’s a Summer Breeze

It was a beautiful summer day, perennial flowers were still in bloom, her vegetable garden ached from neglect since only eight weeks earlier she was diagnosed with an advanced brain tumor, a glioblastoma multiforma.

The Unexpected Present

flat lay photo of alternative medicines

While we were lucky not to get sucked into the hospital “system,” we had to wrangle our way to make sure we have Home Care, an indispensable necessity for Yuri’s proper recovery and my sanity.