News

May 23, 2005

A huge part of Jenny’s life returned this week as she has resumed her favorite passtime of scrap booking. A couple of wonderful women came to our home and taught Jenny how to digital scrap book so she can print her pages and put them in albums. I personally like digital better (not just because we have 20 plus boxes of scrap book supplies packed for our move). I see a spark in Jenny that I have not seen in too long of a time. Her self esteem has escalated and she is so proud. Thanks so much to Laura and Teri for your thoughtfulness and time. I give Jenny 3 months before she is as good as the best digital scrapbookers.

Jenny had her first wheel chair “incident” today. Appearantly she sneezed and darted into the wall as her hand bumped her joystick. The kids yelled for me and I found her stuck on the wall. She only got a little scratch on her foot, but the wall took a beating. Yacktmans and their feet do not get along. The kids and I ticketed her for driving while sneezing and exceeding the sneezing limit by 2.

May 19, 2005

We are less than a month away before we move from our home. Jenny seems to still be excited about the move. I think there are too many memories in this house. Everything either reminds her of what she use to be able to do, or of where she collapsed in the kitchen with her stroke. We are in the process of selling our home and extra van, as well as packing. Overall, we are doing really well.

Jenny has made some marked improvements with her speech. Finally! Again, I would not know what a speedily recovery looked like, but her ability to produce voluntary sound is noticable and she has told me things such as, “I love you”, “Mark” and “hi”, which are things she practices in speech therapy. Perhaps this is why I understand them. Overall, most people would not recognize the sounds she makes, but the big news is that she can make sounds- which was not possible before. She was able to say “Bob” this week, so now her little brother can feel special.

May 10, 2005

Our family has been ill with a cold of sort that just drains your energy, so we have been recoverying for the past week. Jenny’s mom was great and came at this time to help pack Jenny’s “sacred” scrapbooking supplies. Only the mother of such a woman like Jenny could comprehend what was needed to organize and separate supplies. 20-plus boxes later, it was complete. She was also great to have around so we could get a little rest.

Jenny conitinues to demonstrate the ability to do a little bit more than she was once capable of doing. They are small, but measurable marks like being able to reach her face with a washcloth, or reach the window cotrol in the car. These were once impossible tasks a few weeks ago. Speech is an area which is most frustrating. It seems that the more we do to work on speech, the less we get. Jenny does psych herself out most times she tries, but will say simple words, without thinking, on occassion. We keep trying.

April 29, 2005

Jenny experienced a life long dream of seeing her long time love (Donny Osmond) in concert a couple nights ago. We were invited by some wonderful friends who also share a fondness for Donny. I don’t want to put words in another man’s mouth and declare him a groupie, but the husband of Jenny’s friend is a subscriber to the Donny website, has been to another Donny concert, purchased purple socks for the event, and has bought a fare share of Donny memorbillia. He will remain nameless but the evidence speaks for itself. For me, it was like meeting Jenny’s first boyfriend, so I was a bit jealous. Feel free to ask her about her Donny poster that she had as a kid. Jenny had a great time and I appreciate great people like these friends who continue to show such great love to Jenny in so many ways.

I wish I could report some new and incredible speech sounds or voluntary movements. Jenny continues to become stronger in the exhisting movements. Another friend (not a Donny groupie) who helps us with our signing skills made the comment of how Jenny has a much better range with her arm since he saw saw her a couple weeks ago. Jenny is becoming easier to communicate with since her signing has been given the extra boost by this movement. We are slowly adding signs to our vocabulary to hopefully get rid of finger spelling all the time. I tend to look up words she spells most and we work on those.

April 20, 2005

We are just doing our normal therapies and daily routine lately. Our biggest excitement is that we nailed down a date in which we will move. June 20th is the day we leave Indy. We are in a mad dash to get things ready for the big day. Jenny looks forward to working on her computer each day and I am glad she has that outlet. I am still learning that I ned to be careful what I ask for, because I usually do get it. I requested that Jenny be more assertive and let me know what she wants and to not let up until people are aware. Well, I get a mailbox full of e-mails with reminders and requests, as well as lengthy reports of how she feels. It is kind of nice to get this kind of real detail, but now I get into trouble for not following through.