Mom\u2019s therapists continue to be so encouraging with mom and her progress. They seem surprised that she continues to get stronger. I think a lot of people are waiting for her to hit that plateau but she\u2019s not there yet. Even just shy of 6 months, she continues to show improvement.<\/p>\n
Yesterday during OT she was able to use the little portable exerciser with her arms. I had pretty much written that gadget off since it was pretty useless the last time we tried. She had not grip and even with wrapping it up, she was in more pain than it was worth so we stopped using it. She even had difficulty using her legs. Her hip flexors were so weak that she couldn\u2019t keep her knee straight enough to use it. She also had the problem of her foot always slipping off of the pedal. Well yesterday we tried with her arm. And she was able to do it! She used it for a couple of minutes without it needing to be wrapped up. But soon she started to fatigue so the ace wrap was applied. She probably pedaled about 10 minutes with that thing. What an improvement! Her should is getting a lot stronger and that will ultimately help with the subluxation issue she is still battling.<\/p>\n
So THAT was good news. What else has she done? She\u2019s learning to sit up on the edge of the bed by herself! I still have to help move her feet to the edge of the bed (so they are sort of hanging off). But she can wiggle herself enough to start to turn and eventually position herself to pull herself up to sitting using the guard rail. She has done this twice!! This is HUGE. It requires a lot of balance and core strength and I\u2019m glad to see that the exercises she\u2019s been doing are starting to pay off. I have begged her though NOT to try to do this when she\u2019s alone. I told her that if she goes too far forward it\u2019s possible she could take a header and fall face first onto the floor. She could really hurt herself if she\u2019s not careful. I have already threatened her with sending her to a nursing home a couple of times\u2026 I\u2019m pretty sure she knows I\u2019m kidding but not kidding.<\/p>\n
Today I was helping her with a transfer. I had her stand up BY HERSELF (using a grab bar) and pivot before sitting down. She did that totally unassisted. When it was time to transfer her back she was able to do it all again. Of course I had my hand on her \u201cjust in case\u201d but she was so strong and looked great. Again, I had to tell her not to try this on her own. Why do I have to keep reminding her? Well, to be blunt about it, I DON\u2019T TRUST HER. Just today \u2013 after all of my lecturing and threats, I caught her trying to stand up at the sink by herself after she brushed her teeth. That might not seem like a big deal, but think about it. She tries to stand up, loses her balance and falls. She\u2019s going somewhere \u2013 ideally it will be back to sitting in her locked wheelchair (which she DID NOT have locked) OR, into the wall on one side where she might have a chance at catching herself since it\u2019s her stronger side. Or she\u2019ll fall toward her weak side and fall into the toilet, then the wall, then end up on the floor. Or, last but not least, she\u2019ll crumple forward and bang her chin on the sink as she goes down. Do any of these scenarios sound like they\u2019ll have a good outcome (aside from the very first one, but with unlocked wheels that\u2019s not gonna be pretty either).<\/p>\n
All in all, she\u2019s doing really well. She had a friend come by for a visit today and it was really nice to see them catch up. Hopefully he\u2019ll be by again the next time he\u2019s in the area. Right now we\u2019re going to go relax and watch some Forensics Files. I\u2019m glad I finally have someone in the house that likes these shows as much as me!<\/p>\n<\/body>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Mom\u2019s therapists continue to be so encouraging with mom and her progress. They seem surprised that she continues to get…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"nf_dc_page":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-699","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/drb.kfu.temporary.site\/website_2c648198\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/699","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/drb.kfu.temporary.site\/website_2c648198\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/drb.kfu.temporary.site\/website_2c648198\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/drb.kfu.temporary.site\/website_2c648198\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/drb.kfu.temporary.site\/website_2c648198\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=699"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/drb.kfu.temporary.site\/website_2c648198\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/699\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":703,"href":"https:\/\/drb.kfu.temporary.site\/website_2c648198\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/699\/revisions\/703"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/drb.kfu.temporary.site\/website_2c648198\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=699"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/drb.kfu.temporary.site\/website_2c648198\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=699"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/drb.kfu.temporary.site\/website_2c648198\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=699"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}