Rehab is working

Bridget is now almost through her second full day of rehab. Boy oh boy, do they keep her busy! But it is a good thing, as I can already see that she is improving with each day.

Bridget's current impairments are so severe that she finds great difficulty in doing simple things that our brains do unconsciously for us. For instance, it doesn't seem like we have to "do" anything to sit upright in a chair. But for Bridget, multiple problems get in the way of performing this task. For one, Bridget has no idea where the center of her body is in space, so she doesn't know if she's sitting up straight or not, or even if she's looking straight forward or not. Second, she can't really feel the right side of her body. So when she does try to center herself, she leans considerably to her left, because that's the side of her body she can feel, and thus tries to center according to that half (but the body, of course, cannot be balanced on one side only). Third, when people try to tell her to "center" herself, they naturally want to tell her to use visual cues - e.g., "look straight ahead at the clock on the wall." But Bridget's double vision makes this very tricky: she sees two clocks, one a little to the left and the other a little to the right of where the real clock is. On top of all of this, the room always feels like it's spinning while she's doing this.

Going back about 3-4 days ago, these problems were huge barriers on Bridget's mobility. She was not even really able sit up from a laying position by herself. But even before she started rehab, she was getting better at this, and now she can do this mostly by herself. She is getting much better at transferring from the bed to the wheelchair. In the last two days she has gained skill at "scooting" in the bed or the chair - a verb I normally encounter in my developmental studies of baby locomotion. So, even though the gains are small, any gain is good! Her PT today told her today that in rehab, they measure improvement in inches, not miles.

Bridget has 3 hours or therapy per day: 1.5 hours of physical therapy, and 1.5 hours of occupational therapy, each split into two 45 minute sessions (so 4 sessions per day). Both PT and OT have been working a lot on Bridget's balance/vestibular issues. They have her shift her wait while sitting, for example. PT also focuses on getting Bridget's strength back, and has been giving her exposure to standing for short periods - this is extremely challenging for Bridget right now. OT has been focusing on Bridget's hand coordination as well, to work on Bridget's ataxia. Bridget says I should take video of her doing these things, so people can see what she's like. I will try tomorrow. One thing that Bridget has going for her is that she's a *really* good patient (motivated, persistent), and I think that helps the therapists push her to (reasonable) limits.

All of this therapy makes Bridget SO tired. And her appetite is absolutely through the roof! For those of you who are familiar with Bridget's eating habits, you would be shocked to see how ravenous she is at mealtime. She eats much more than she normally used to and much faster than she normally used to. But this is a good thing! Her brain is saying "I need more energy to repair myself!"

Tonight our friends Karen and Alicia came by for a fun visit. Karen made more of the cookies that Karen made when she was in the NCCU and couldn't eat anything, and she was forced to smell them when I would eat them. Now, she can eat them! And Alicia brought some banana bread and delicious raspberries. Good times were had! We even played some Scattergories, and discovered that Bridget can still kick ass at that game. So certainly no cognitive deficits! :)