Jenny has had a “bumpy” few days and continues to be a tough woman. She has had a number of bumps and bruises stemming from various reasons. Her new chair is awesome, but she has got her foot caught under the foot peddle as it was moving, the arms are too narrow and bruise her legs, and she pinched her toes between the table and foot rest when leaning it back. We do have an appointment to fix some of these wheel chair concerns. The worst incident was when she sneezed herself off the toilet and landed on her face. I was nearby, but not close enough. It was a weird experinece to see someone fall slowly like that, but not be able to brace their fall with her hands. It was painful, but Jenny was incredible with handleing the pain. Her face is only a little sore on her cheek, but no bruise. It did cause her to be able to pucker her lips better on command. Discomfort has always helped motivate her intentional movements. She kind of liked being able to move her left leg and foot. Instead of crying, she was laughing and excited as she told me to watch as she made her foot move. She is doing good, but has had more accidents and bruises these past two weeks than in the past 10 months.

Jenny continues to do well with driving around the house and using her arm support. We were excited to see her show some strength in her legs by being able to bend (a little) and then strengthen them (a little) while at a 75 degree tilt on the tilt table. It is a good step in the right direction. Jenny feels a mixture of some successes and a large degree of frustrations and losses. I would say that her life is still very much filled with trials and struggles that are difficult each and every day. Our big goal is to get her speech working. There are glimpses of sounds and words all the time, but nothing that is solid and permanent. I would love to hear her voice again and be able to know what she is thinking and in need of without the slow/difficult process of ASL spelling (which is still tons better than the blink spelling).

Jenny had set a few goals for herself for this Christmas and by her one year anniversary of her stroke. At he begining, she was hammered with the fact that she was going to be “locked in” and never able to do anything. She later began showing improvements, so she decided to set pretty lofty goals. Now that December is here, she feels (felt?) let down that she never reached her goals- which were related to speaking and walking. I think she realizes that she has come far past the point that she is suppose to be. I am not sure if she buys into the fact that her desire is a large part of what got her this far.

Jenny continues to show great improvement with speach therapy. She was very vocal today with a variety of sounds that she has been working on. However, she also reported feeling a little weak and slightly more blurry vision. This has occurred before. We have increased her physical activity, so she may be a little warn out. One of the things we do now is electrical stimulation. I like it and she hates it- like normal. I think that is the main reason behind more movement on her left side.