Thursday September 22, 2005

Thursday September 22, 2005 Zack was up at 7:45 to eat breakfast, shower, dress and go for a walk. 9:00 Speech with Kathy and she drilled him with questions: date, name of this place, and what do we do in therapy. They matched up pictures to words and worked on reading. He did better today than he has all week. 9:30 P.T. with Amy and he is on the treadmill for 20 minutes at a higher speed and more of an incline than before. Amy commented that it was twice what he was able to do 10 days ago. Then the daily torture of stretching his hamstrings, which really hurts. I would be curious to know what teenage boys out there don’t have tight hamstrings. O.T. with Mary Beth and she taped paper to the wall and had him print his name on a line and then write it in cursive. She explained that writing it on a wall takes more control than writing it on a table. She put him on the computer to snowboard and drive a car. Each time he played he improved his score. Then they played Black Jack and Zack was the primary winner, fair and square. Zack takes an hour nap before lunch and after he eats wants to take a shower. I explain that he had a shower this morning and it really isn’t a good time and he says, “Look at these pistols on my face”. I explain that he can’t mean pistols because that is something you shoot and kill someone with and he must mean pimples. “Yeah, the pimples kill me”. He is getting back to normal because he uses to take three or four showers a day. Afternoon speech and they work on reading comprehension and sentence completion. He does 50% of it independently. Kathy has heard about his dancing and wanted to see his moves so he entertained her until our time was up. P.T. with Amy and they throw a football while Zack had to keep one foot resting on a balloon without popping it. This teaches balance and physical restraint (you have to be very conscious of the amount of pressure on the balloon). They alternated feet and everyone thought he was going to pop the balloon. She had him stand on different surfaces while holding one leg up…again working on balance. Mary Beth (O.T.) is ready for him early so they work on days of the week, months and weather conditions. He named all the months and put them into seasons. Back in the room for a nap by 4:00. I talked to Kerri from Recreational Therapy and she has our outing scheduled for next Thursday. We are going to 4th Street Live to go bowling at Lucky Strike. Zack loves to bowl and it is a great atmosphere there so it should be a lot of fun. Any of his friends that want to join us we should be there by 5:30 Aunt Penny and Uncle Jay stop by and we go down to the lobby for Graeters Ice Cream. Jay pays for Zack’s ice cream and I ask him if he knows who Jay is. He calls him “the civilian” (well he’s not wrong). We go back up to the room and he is full of ice cream and decides he needs to lie down again before eating dinner. During dinner Taylor, Dan and his Mom arrive and Zack decides we need to take a walk to McDonalds. He must be taking it seriously when I said he needs to gain 10 pounds before we leave. We head to the gym and play Chinese Checkers and when we return to the room it is full of visitors. Zack is surprised and pleased that a bunch of his friends came to see him tonight. We turn on the music and he dances. It is a nice evening of fellowship and I get to enjoy the company of other Mom’s. We walk the last visitors to the lobby and Zack tells me as soon as he gets home he is getting in bed. It is ironic that he refers to his room as home now but it won’t be much longer. Saturday Oct. 1st we go home and I want to have a homecoming at our house with all Zack’s friends on Saturday afternoon. I want to welcome him back home around 1:00 for those that can make it. I also got my wish and his surgery will be Wed. Oct. 5th to have his bone flap put back. He will start Frazier East on Monday Oct. 10th just as I had hoped. Everything is falling into place. Gods perfect plan continues to unravel and amaze me. I consider Gods word to us in Isaiah 43:18-19 “Do not remember the former things, nor consider the things of old. Behold, I will do a new thing, now it shall spring forth: shall you not know it? I will even make a road in the wilderness and rivers in the desert. God is at work on a new creation in Zack and I can’t wait to see what springs forth. Please pray for an end to the aphasia and complete recovery.