New Digs and Unwanted Guests

Man, we really wish we could have a tearjerker for you guys every post. All those comments were just too much fun. The truth is though the successes that we celebrate daily are not always so compelling or obvious. There is regular progress and we never take it for granted, even encouraging Ben’s occupational therapist to applaud along with us when he completes a new task or shows an impressive command over his fingers. But these mini-milestones are only part of a whole, sometimes interminably slow process of recovery that is not easily captured by a laundry list of physical changes. Even the reconciliation between Ben’s arm and brain that made us all misty would have meant nothing if it weren’t placed in the larger picture of what Ben was feeling, struggling with, expecting, wishing, etc. So I am afraid today and many days, we will have nothing ‘profound’ to report regarding Ben’s physical transformation but that does not mean that we won’t always have much to say on his ‘progress’. You will just have to trust us that in some ways it is all progress, it is all related, and really, it is just all about living, loving and being happy, no? And of course, we promise that if there are significant advances you will be the first to share them with us. For example, the first time Ben stubs his left toe and follows it up by punching the wall with his left hand we will post about it or when he finally manages to flip off one of the many errant taxi drivers in KL we will report it to you without delay.

So as for the ‘progress’. The biggest milestone since we last left you was definitely getting the heck out of the hospital. Not just because it meant our first step towards working our way back to normalcy but also for the sheer effort it took to secure our walking papers. We actually waited about 6 hours on Saturday to get discharged before getting fed up and deciding to go AWAL. At about 5:30, we finally just left and moved to our new digs up the street. They told us they were having some trouble with insurance and to wait but seriously we had had enough. Things did finally work themselves out (thanks to CAN assistance, the insurance intermediary that helped me through this whole process. They really gave insurance companies a good name and made my life easy.) but we were technically AWAL from the hospital for 3 days. Ben was only officially discharged this morning.

Our new digs are really awesome. Not only does the apartment appear to be taken from the pages of a Crate&Barrel catalog, we have a pool, gym (which Ben has promised to avoid), wireless internet, and best of all, we have a grocery store across the street that can satisfy just about any craving we have for American grub from microwave popcorn and marshmallows to frozen pizzas. It definitely is a huge step in the right direction, especially because Ben is no longer a patient 24 hours but a living breathing human being taking advantage of the giant flat screen TV, comfy couch, and incredible pirated DVD collection supplied by concerned friends. We will heading to Bangi this weekend to bring up most of our things and really complete the move.

Actually, it will be interesting visiting our place in Bangi this weekend since we are unsure of what we will find there. We know our strange Korean roommates have returned from their vacation so we are sure to find them there but we have a sneaking suspicion that we may also encounter a Singaporean squatter. It seems that when news of our situation got out our apartment quickly turned into a hostel. Malaysians are very quick to give away things that are not theirs. Some may consider this insensitivity, others may call it generosity or communality but no matter how you look at it, it can complicate things.

Apparently, our teachers saw our current stay in the hospital as a timely and convenient stroke of luck. They had new students to house and we had left our big house in Bangi nearly vacant. So when Allan (the potential Singaporean squatter) returned from Singapore and found that his dorm room had been commandeered by someone else and he had no place to stay, they had just the solution– ‘Oh, my goodness, this is perfect, Ben just had a stroke and he is stuck in the hospital, you can stay at their house’. We honestly did not know whether to laugh or cry when we received the text message from Allan thanking us for letting him stay in our ‘guest’ room temporarily and wondering about the rent for the next few months. Actually, Ben was livid. I was mostly humored by the sheer absurdity of the whole situation. Can you believe it, the kid did not even say a word to us about Ben’s health, etc., he just moved right in. Our poor Korean roommates were ambushed by the whole situation as well. They had no idea if we invited Allan to stay or not. What a mess. Ben nearly stroked out again he was so mad and to settle him down, I was forced to tell Allan in no uncertain terms to “get the F out of our house by the next morning”. Funny thing is, the kid actually had the gall to reply to my demand with a request to stay a few more days.

Lots of love to you all,

Sven and Stacy