It's true! The new bathing system was finally delivered!
I want to thank the Lanterman Regional Center for paying $3,668 of this $4,368 bathing system. We were then going to cover the remaining $700 when our friends at the Talbert Family Foundation emailed me. They had seen my previous post on the Bathing System Saga and offered to pay for the entire system! Well, as luck would have it, this was the day after Lanterman agreed to pay their portion. So I asked Julie Talbert if they would like to pay the remaining $700. She said yes and the check immediately came in the mail! How's that for generosity?!
It then took 2 weeks to order and a couple days to build. Then the came to deliver it and we ran into a hitch. Well, of course we did! Nothing is simple, right? See, we live in a house built in the 1940's. The bathroom cabinet cuts into the bathtub in this wacky way. The way the seat was set up, Soren was supposed to be facing the shower head, but he would also be facing the cabinet. Soren has some long legs that are only getting longer. There was going to be no room for his legs in between the chair and the cabinet. So I asked for them to turn the system around so that Soren's head would be facing away from the shower head. Way easier said than done. The whole thing had to be taken away, taken apart, rebuilt and brought back. Which, of course, took another week or so.
The guy came back on Tuesday with it all reassembled. He showed me how it worked, we did adjustments, and all seemed great. I then suggested that we put Soren in the seat to do final tweaks on the seat and make sure it actually worked with his 60 pound boy in it. Well, good thing I did because while it glided smooth as silk without Soren, it was suddenly all whackadoo once this big boy was throwing things all off kilter. But the technician was great and did all the adjustments. He was very serious about making sure Soren was safe and comfortable and that I knew what I was doing before he left. I was actually impressed.
So yesterday, we took this baby out for its first run. I used the lift to get Soren to his bed, stripped him down, used the lift to get him to the bath seat, wheeled him to the bathroom, clicked him over to the tub, showered him (and got a bit of a shower myself), clicked him back over, wheeled him back to his room, and used the lift to get him back to his bed. Viola!
Now, in all honesty, it was way clunkier than than. We have a lot of kinks to work out. The transferring to and from the seat could go more smoothly. Soren seemed quite mortified through the entire process, though he wasn't fighting me, which was good. And we need to replace the shower head with a hand held one to make that part easier.
But we'll get there! After all, I'm going to have a lot of practice!
I am just so thankful to have this new system and to be figuring out this new set of challenges.
Amy
