Paul's Update - 02/28/06

Dear Friends:

Today was a mostly quiet day. Occupational Therapy started at 9am. The therapist had him work on tracking with his eyes, stand and balance himself by putting his hands on a table and then lean forward to look out the window then sit down. They did that a couple of times. She tried to get him to work with a puzzle that had three pieces. He wouldn't do that at all. Speech therapy was at 11am. They worked with swallowing & puckering to exercise his face. She lifted his right hand to his mouth and asked him to kiss it. He could do that with help. He made some sounds with his voice again today! It appears he is waking up his vocal chords. She put a spoon in his mouth and wanted him to close his lips on it without biting down on it. This is to prepare him to use utensils to eat with. He was able to do that a couple of times so she tried to give him a little piece of ice. He was able to chew it!! There was a doctor in the room doing an evaluation at the time. He asked if she was going to try applesauce but she responded "not yet" since she wanted to work more on his swallowing first. After therapy he stayed up in the wheelchair. When Dad went to lunch he sat in the wheelchair at the nurses station. After lunch he went back to his room. Tabby had brought some of Paul's motorcycle magazines. Dad sat them on a table so he could look at them. Dad tried to get him to turn the pages but he couldn't do that. He seemed to enjoy the magazines though. At 2pm was physical therapy. He had been up since 9am and when she tried to have him stand up he didn't want anything to do with it!! She decided to work on a mat with him instead. He laid on the mat and practiced rolling from side to side with minimal help. While he was there a doctor came to look at his arms. Since they are so stiff, they plan to start him on a low dose of muscle relaxers to help loosen them up (he got his first dose with tonight's regular medicines). Physical Therapy will be at 9am on Wednesday to see if starting earlier makes it easier for him to work out. At 3pm the second speech therapist came in. He really wasn't very interested in doing anything by then. She made it a short session. Maybe tomorrow she will work with him after he has rested. Wednesday's schedule will be PT-9am, S-11am, OT-1pm, S-3pm.

God Bless, Lynne & Carl