Josh Beecroft Recovery Updates

January 21, 2018 Hi, everyone. It's been another couple of weeks since our last post. We are happy to report that we feel like Josh is still making progress. No, it isn't like a couple of months ago when every day brought surprising improvements. But it is gratifying to see the young man continue to improve. The biggest change we've seen in the last couple of weeks is in the area of initiation. Josh is more likely now than anytime since the accident to initiate discussion. He'll now ask questions and raise issues whereas he really never did that before. He is still far from conversational (even Josh 1.0 was pretty quiet) but we feel like he is making progress. And he STILL struggles with initiating brushing his teeth. If we don't help him, he'll stand at his sink for 30 minutes trying to get his toothbrush into his mouth. Once it's in, he's fine. He still has his challenges, though. One is keeping his pants on! He is so slender (weighing in at 133

January 3, 2018 Happy New Year to all.  2017 was a very difficult year, dominated, as it was, by Josh's injury.  We hope that 2018 will be a much better year, as Josh continues his recovery and life eases back into a more normal routine. The last two weeks were relatively good weeks for Josh.  He enjoyed a nice Christmas at home in Portland with his family, including Eden & RJ and their boys.  Josh's emotions are so flat now that it is difficult to know how he is feeling, but he always seems to enjoy being with people.  This was certainly the case with his sister and her family. For New Years, we drove to Tri-Cities, WA to welcome Josh's cousin, Bradley, home from his mission in Brazil and to spend some fun time with Mary's family.  Again, Josh seemed to enjoy being around his cousins and aunts and uncles, who are all very warm and kind towards him. Most of the medical concerns from our last post have been resolved -- more or less.  There really doesn't

December 17, 2017 It's been another two weeks since our last post. It was a rough two weeks for Team Josh -- maybe the first time in this nearly six-month ordeal where we felt like Josh regressed. Things are looking a bit better as we type this but we'll have to see if that trend continues. Two weeks ago we were in a four-car accident while visiting family in Washington, DC. We were on the freeway on our way home from viewing Christmas lights at the temple and ran into the car in front of us. We were then rear-ended by the car behind us. The poor car didn't survive the accident but all four passengers got away without any serious injuries. Josh was sitting in the front passenger seat and somehow managed to break his glasses, but he seemed to be just fine. But by Friday of that week (over a week ago now), Josh was exhibiting some signs that he wasn't doing well. His stomach seemed to be discolored and distended, which could be a sign of internal bleeding, and his n

December 3, 2017 Hello, friends and family. It's been two weeks since our last post. Our goal is to post every Sunday, so sorry about missing last week. It's been a wild two weeks for the Taylor family. We traveled to Tri-Cities, WA to spend Thanksgiving with Mary's family. Josh came with us, of course, and really seemed to enjoy hanging out with his cousins. Josh 2.0 doesn't say much and has relatively flat emotions, but he clearly enjoyed this time. One night, a large group of cousins and aunts and uncles played a marathon game of Scum. Josh not only enjoyed participating, he actually did very well and held his own against everyone else. He seems to excel in strategy situations. After a few days in Tri-Cities, we went back to Portland. Paul left the next day on a three-day trip to Boston for his work. When he got back, we left the next day to visit Michelle's family in Washington, DC, which is where we are as we type this update. Josh is with us on this trip

November 19, 2017 Dear Family & Friends: It has been more than a month since we last posted anything here about Josh. Our original intent after returning to Portland at the beginning of October was to cut back on the number of posts but to continue to post periodically. But Josh's recovery is much different now than when we first returned. He doesn't have the big, dramatic stories from day to day. Instead, his progress is more subtle and routine. After 3 weeks felt like there wasn't enough material to keep the blog going. But a number of you have asked about the blog just in the past week, so we will try to be more diligent in posting to give those of you who aren't here in Portland more of an idea about how things are going. Feel free to contact us at any time if you want more information. We appreciate your love and concern. Thanksgiving will be 5 months since the accident, 4 months since Josh transferred from OHSU to Craig Hospital in Denver, and 6 weeks si

October 10, 2017 Dear friends and family. We have not forgotten about you. We are all back in Portland now -- Mary and Josh flew in last Friday and Paul drove in last Saturday. It has been so awesome to be home. Even Josh seems to be flourishing back at home. He seems to be much more of a normal person than a patient in a hospital. As I guess we have now illustrated, we don't intend to continue to post every day on this blog. First, we're running out of exciting things to say now that we're home. And second, the changes in Josh are more subtle now and probably not worth mentioning on a daily basis. We are still trying to decide what to do with Josh now that we are home. We are looking into both an in-patient community center on the east side of Portland as well as an out-patient rehab center that is much closer to our home in Beaverton. Both programs are run by the same rehab group. The decision really comes down to whether we think it is better for Josh to live with