One Love!
One Love T-Shirt Sponsors:
Recent Donations:
Archive for the ‘Friends Visit With Chi’ Category
Hangin’ With Chi…
hey all…
chi looks great! he is looking more and more like himself. he looks like he has gained a little weight.. face looks more filled out then last time i saw him. chi is definately showing signs of being more aware and focused. he has started lifting his legs and kicking them off the side of his chair… almost like he is trying to go somewhere!
i got in late last nite so we didn't do much since he was tired.. and well… so was i. i put some jeff buckley on and slept in the other bed next to him… every once in awhile i would wake to him making yawning noises.. even hearing his voice in that way just sounds good. so.. after our slumber party the next morning stephanie came over to get him up.. we got him cleaned up, dressed and in his chair and then took him for a walk outside.
then we came over to her place (stephanie lives in the same apt. complex – she is SO amazing with him.. i don't know what we would do without her!) and have just been hanging out here all day. recently we (the one love fam) purchased a amazon kindle for chi… it does text to speech so we
can order books for him and it reads the words to him. i got it all set up for him today and ordered a book.. once it started playing his eyes opened up HUGE and he just started soaking it all up. you can tell he is really listening to the book being read. at one point momma j was calling me on my phone so i paused the book.. chi looked at me like “hey what happened to my book??!” …i am not one to piss off our boy so i quickly got off the phone so he could resume listening. he is still listening to it now hours later. so ya.. chi says thanks one love family for the kindle!
tomorrow dr. defina and his crew will be arriving. i will let you all know how that goes… i may pop back in tonight and do another update… but for sure tomorrow.
i'm really proud of chi.. he is so strong. i have mad respect for this man. his tenacity is inspiring!
one love for chi,
gina
“Hi”……..
We Love You Chi!
hey all…
just another quick update to let you know i talked to chi again twice yesterday.. during our second call he was being SUPER vocal. stephanie and i kept encouraging him to get some simple words out… he made lots of vowel sounds.. and “uh” sounds…
then i asked him if he could say “hi” to me… then i could hear him working himself up to make a sound… and he got the “H” sound out. it was obvious he was comprehending my requests (which is huge!) and was making efforts to say “hi”!
it takes an incredible amount of his energy to do this… it was the most vocal i have heard him be in awhile.
stephanie and i continued to cheer him on and encourage him to keep practicing using those vocal chords… and he kept on making sounds. it was awesoome!
keep praying for our brother!
one love for chi,
gina
Mark from dredg…
Hello, this is Mark from dredg.
Updates.. Wasabi… Love… And More…
hey all,
first of all let me say sorry this has taken me awhile to get posted… once we got back from cali we played the catch up game on everything… emails, phone calls, kids etc.
so… what a great trip.. and as always it came and went way too fast. when ryan and i first got there our amazing momma j and mae greeted us with open arms and huge hugs.. i got to meet stephanie (the angel neighbor) and what a GOD SEND this woman is. i love you steph and appreciate you more than words can express.
we went into the room where chi was and apparently stephanie and momma j had been telling him all day how we were coming and he stayed awake all day.. so by the time we got there he was pretty tired but did wake up enough to realize we had finally made it… i looked into his eyes and told him how much we all love him and have his back during this journey.. as i was talking to him some tears rolled from the corners of his eyes… so i know he heard me. he is amazing. he looks good. his presence is so great to be around (some things never change i guess). he tried over and over to sit up.. almost as if he wanted to greet us. then we let him rest.. and just sat there and held his hand and visited with everyone.
the next day i woke up early and went over to talk to him and hold his hand some more (did this alot).. i don’t know how to explain it but.. you can tell when he is listening. there were times when it seemed that maybe he wasn’t focusing on me.. but more times than not he was focusing on us in the room. we watched movies… pineapple express, walk hard.. (walk hard we watched twice because we laughed so much!) with him and told him about all the love and support he had. he is aware of all of you and all the prayers you send him.
i showed him the one love for chi bracelets i had made for the benefit and he looked those over for quite awhile… showed him the t-shirts too.
one nite we were having sushi and momma j was talking about how much he loved wasabi.. i told her “hey let’s give him a little taste” so we went over to chi and momma j gave him a little tiny bit on his tongue.. he smacked that around in his mouth and obviously was loving tasting it again.. so much that he said “MORE!”.. i looked at him and said “what brother.. what did you say??” and he said “MORE!” again and then said “MOM!”.. so obviously he knew who was holding out on the wasabi! so she gave him a bit more. [i use CAPS to not say that he shouted it.. but he said it clearly.]
every moment we spent with him was beautiful and i could tell he really appreciated our company.
the next day we had to leave early to the benefit. we drove to LA and there i met aunt renee, smokey and matt (love you guys!) .. also our other stephanie who has also been a GODSEND! she is the one who has been helping me by making and shipping out the one love shirts. thank you steph.. i appreciate you so much. they had the booth all set up by the time ryan and i got there and had a TON of shirts and helping hands with her. thanks to you all for your help in running the booth and auction. the benefit was great. we really raised some great awareness.. and that was our major goal. we want to thank danny hill, sonny, the band lit for letting us use their place, and everyone else who showed up to show support. especially dr. defina! chi’s new doc from NJ. he is an awesome man. positive outlook.. great presence. the day of the benefit was the same day dr. defina and two of the doctors on his team evaluated chi. he had so many inspiring stories about other people he has been able to help and even recover (which is his goal for chi.. recovery!).
i also got to meet pak (chi’s brother), and quite a few other one love family members there too! that was awesome! i met so many people.. i wish i could list you all.. but just know that if i met you that nite it was a pleasure! we ended up raising $2500 in donations and t-shirt sales.. and again.. alot of awareness. guitar edge magazine was there.. and revolver magazine.. the local news and more. thank you ALL!
this is from when we got back from the benefit i was sitting next to chi and had my hand on his chest and he was holding my arm.
the next morning we got up and drove back to spend another day with chi. at one point i helped mae with chi in holding him up while she changed his sheets… i was holding him up and looking into his eyes and just telling him encouraging words… he was looking at me so deeply i told mae i felt he was looking into my soul. when he focuses.. he FULL ON focuses on you. i reassured him again that we had his back.. always!
before we knew it…….. time to go. :( when we were saying bye i was telling chi to keep doing what he was doing.. being strong… taking those baby steps and that we would be back soon.. and he said “UH-HUH!” and then started making lots of noises as if trying to get out so many other words. momma j had to pick her chin up off the floor. he really responded to us alot while we were there.
being there just made me anxious for our next trip out to see chi.
today we had a conference call with dr. defina so he could share the results of the numerous scans they did. momma j, ming and myself were on the call. the doctors were pleased with the fact that chi has alot of integrity left in his brain. they expect continuous progress over time. dr. defina feels we will be seeing little improvements once chi is fully on the new protocol but clearly this will be an ongoing process. he showed us the pictures of the scans they did and showed us where the damage or problems were and also showed us areas that were functioning normally and/or had the potential to function properly. from what i gathered it seems it will be somewhat of a remapping process. there are some areas now that are over functioning and some that are not functioning at proper levels. all and all.. everything that he had to report sounded very promising. another great thing to hear from the doc was that he and his team are familiar with the issues chi has and they have solutions.
much love to you all our dear one love for chi family. your continued love, support and prayers means so very much!
one love for chi,
gina
Meet Dr. Defina…
Dr. DeFina
hey all,
i am working on a blog about our cali trip to visit chi and will have it up shortly.. but for now i wanted to share this video of dr. defina at the benefit. he is amazing! great things coming!!
dr. defina from IBRF (international brain research foundation: www.ibrfinc.org)
one love for chi,
gina
Far Frontman Talks About Chi Cheng
One Love For Chi!
Far frontman Jonah Matranga has told Rock Sound about Deftones bassist Chi Cheng and the band’s new album ‘At Night We Live’.
Far frontman Jonah Matranga has told Rock Sound about the band’s new album ‘At Night We Live’. The title track of the record was inspired by a visit to see Deftones bassist Chi Cheng, who has been in hospital since a car crash in late 2008.
“The night after I had been to visit Chi in hospital I quite literally had a dream that I was hanging out with him,” Matranga told Rock Sound recently. “In the dream I was sitting with him but I remember the look of his eyes and how different they were, in hospital his eyes were open but he was non-responsive as far as I could tell. The song’s lyrics start ‘I dreamt that you were alive / I dreamt of your eyes / They weren’t just open / They were engaged / And somebody said, or maybe I read / In the daytime we’re dead / But at night we live’.”
“That song is about Chi and about that dream. Being around Chi he’s both gone and still here, it just begs a lot of questions about where existence is, about keeping someone alive while letting them go.”
The singer also had the following update for fans and well wishers:
“The truth is it is incredibly hard to say what is happening with Chi,” the singer admitted heavily. “I can safely say he is miracle territory, if he were to be playing a show next year that would solidly be in the category of miracle. Now inbetween that, ever becoming conscious as we understand, that is also pretty solidly in the category of miracle but as I speak there could be some kind of major change in his state. I do know that they are taking wonderful care of him, he has family and friends around him and I think for everyone it is something of a mystery just what will happen next. There is not much solid to say except that he is still alive and he seems to be doing better.” For more progress on Chi head to www.oneloveforchi.com and for the latest on Far head to www.thebandfar.com.
[Article: http://www.rocksound.tv/news/article/far-frontman-talks-about-chi-cheng]
oneloveforchi,
gina
8 days………..
one love for chi!
hey all,
hope you all had a great holiday break. i just wanted to let you all know that ryan (my husband) and i will be heading out to visit chi the 14th – 18th. saturday we will be at the benefit helping with that.. (i will be posting up pics to the website when we are at the benefit on the 16th) but the rest of the time we will be staying with chi, momma j and mae. while i am there i am going to be reading your messages to chi – so if you have anything you want to tell him be sure to post it here: http://oneloveforchi.com/index.php/letters-to-chi/#comments
i also wanted to let you guys know.. you…ONE LOVE FAM – are awesome! your continued support and love for chi is beautiful. you are what makes the one love family/community such a great place to visit. the website wouldn’t be what it is today without you… so i thank you for all you do that makes this such a special place.
2010 is going to be a great year of progress for chi. he will be starting this new protocol and i have huge faith it is going to make a big difference in chi’s recovery.
one love for chi,
gina
I Was So Blown Away I Totally Forgot What I Called Momma J For…
so right now i called momma j to let her know something.. and i asked where she was.. she said at the hospital… so i said.. let me talk to him! so she puts the phone to his ear and i start telling him how ryan and i miss him already and can’t wait to be back with him.. i get not even half way thru that sentence and chi started trying to talk to me making all sorts of vowel sounds. it was so good to hear his voice again. the more i talked the more he tried to… i told him we would be back soon and get him outside to do something more fun.. he loved that idea… i could tell cuz he got louder. i told him… don’t get frustrated and don’t give up brother.. we are fighting the fight with you and just keep the faith.. we love you chi! he responded to everything i said. i was so blown away i totally forgot what i called momma j for…
he just keeps on amazing me…
one love for chi,
gina
Member Comments: