Progress Report

Over the last couple of days I've heard from a number of Sam's therapists and had an updated progress report this afternoon. Sam is doing very well in cognitive and speech therapy. In cognitive they are very impressed with how she communicates and asks questions about her brain injury and her ability to retrieve information. In speech therapy, they are impressed with her verbal output (she talks a lot!), and is remembering a lot more. She also is doing quite well in Physical Therapy too. She has been upgraded as of today to solid food and to nectar thickened liquids. Formerly she had been on soft foods and honey thickened liquids. I was hoping for a final upgrade to thin liquids, which is the last step...i.e. water and such, but they are extremely cautious, and so it will likely be another two weeks before this can happen. This means that Sam still has her feeding tube in, since, they need to use it to hydrate her and for additional nutritional supplements. Also, I planned a "family day" in another week or so, and will be able to attend all of Sam's therapy classes and see for myself how the therapists work with her, and how she is responding.

Last night when I visited Sam, she was in good form. She asked me how my day was and I started to actually tell her in detail until I realized that I was going a bit overboard with my answer. I probably should have just said 'fine", but I know that I really wanted to talk with her. She didn't mind my answer, but I'm sure she was not following most of what I was saying. I also talked with her about some of her colleagues at work who sent their best wishes to her and I know that she understood who they were. When I couldn't come up with the name of one of her supervisors husband's name, she did (it was slightly off, but close enough to spark my memory!). I also now have a pass to take Sam out for the day, and so hope that within the next week or so, will have an exciting outdoor adventure.