Thursday, June 10, 2010

Rehab!! And the Miracles continue!

Yeh!! They made the change! We are now officially in Rehab! And what a difference it has made. All of a sudden, decisions were made and orders written and things cleared up! It's been so helpful!
Lots of good progress today; each therapy session got better. Shannon worked for nearly an hour in PT today! Leg lifts with weights, climbing stairs, cross pattern crawling, playing her favorite game, Bop! (not!!), and walking up and down the halls. Good hard work!
OT was great as well. Her writing skills improved dramatically. The challenge is getting the eyes to work where they are suppose to and being able to focus on what Shan needs to look at. She did another puzzle--25 piece this time. And we played a game of Uno which she decided she didn't like because she didn't win! :)
Speech was incredible. Her eating skills have really improved--so much that she will be tested by the speech therapist tomorrow to see if she is ready to handle the next step up--the nectar thickness diet. That will open more possibilities to what she can eat. They have turned down her feeds to where she only gets them at night and it is only 750 calories with additional fluid as needed according to what she has taken in during the day. This should make her eat more during the day. Once she meets all the necessary calories and fluid intake requirements, she will lose that feeding tube! The last one! We are excited for that but know that it can still be a while. The therapists talk about weeks, we think about days!
Today Shannon had pancakes for breakfast--not pureed. She really enjoyed them. This afternoon it was ground hamburger with mashed potatoes and gravy, and this evening it was ravioli. She did not like the ground hamburger at all. So a couple of bites and that was it. They told us that chewing would take a lot of energy and be very tiring for Shannon. I thought that seemed strange but I have witnessed that today. I guess when you haven't chewed anything for a month, your mouth really does need time to get its strength back to do its job. It was so interesting watching her facial expressions and seeing how tired she was getting. We are grateful that she is so willing to keep at it and do the best she can. She met her fluid intake (thickened) for the day. I am so pleased and proud of how well Shannon is doing.
Shannon is still having headaches. We are not sure how much of it is related to the itchy-ness of her scalp where the scars are still healing or what makes her so uncomfortable. We continue to give her tylenol and occasionally Motrin. She loves to have ice packs on her head, they seem to help with the pain. Even at that, she is pleasant and fun to be around!
How grateful we are to see the miracle continuing!!

6 comments:

  1. Yea, Shannon! You are amazing! We pray for you to have strength and a speedy recovery everyday! We love you!
    Greg and Amy

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  2. Shan, Annika loves hearing of your progress. She really wants to come see you. Pheobe, would it be ok for Annika to come see Shan this afternoon? It would most likely be around 3:30-4:00 pm. Please let me know if it ok.
    MaryAnn

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  3. Rehab - so many huge steps in a great direction, yeay!

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  4. The fact that you still hate Uno makes me smile. Becky Cox would love to hear that all your Uno playing days in prostart have gone to waste :) Congratulations Shan, you're doing wonderfully and I'm so proud of you :) Rehab is a huge leap forward, so pat yourself on the back darling. I love you!

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  5. We are so excited for how far you have come! I was suprised when Nephi had a hard time chewing too--his neurosurgeon said a lot of it had to do with the fact that he cut through the muscles in his head, it takes away a lot of the strength. Keep up the good work Shannon!
    Clare

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