Day 43 - Thursday January 26, 2012

Another great day.  Bridgett is talking all the time now.  This morning when she woke up, she whispered once and I reminded her to talk so she did.  Otherwise, she talked all day.  And boy is she talking!  It's so great to hear!  When she gets tired she starts speaking some nonsense stuff.  But most of the time she is pretty clear.  She does forget words she wants to use.  That is something that will improve as she does speech therapy, and really any therapy.  All of the therapists work on speech, naming, etc. in addition to their specialty.  In fact, two days ago Bridgett was still forgetting that she could actually speak and reverting to whispers.  When she went to physical therapy with Randy, every time she whispered he insisted she speak instead.  By the end of the session she was speaking all the time.  Today he said I think I really helped with her speech, and very likely he did!   All of her therapy went well today.  I asked Randy, so unofficially speaking, by the time she gets released do you think that she will have her balance and be walking fine.  (she does really awesome, but still has to be spotted and still leans, etc.)  He said, I can't guarantee it, but given her rate of progress I think that she will be walking great and having good balance in familiar surroundings.  Of course, safety is always an issue and you don't want her hitting her head again.  That made me really happy!  Speech went well.  Both of Bridgett's usual therapists were gone today, so we met with a gal she's only seen once.  But it was good.  I don't think I've talked about this yet.  Speech therapist are the ones that are in charge of the orders about which diet the patient is on, and who gets to upgrade etc.  So, Monday when Rebecca came in to help Bridgett with breakfast I was talking about how she bites the straw so much and it's hard to get her drink finished.  I said that one of the nurses started having her take a drink without a straw to get her pills down and Rebecca said talk to speech and asked to have her upgraded.  So, I went to speech therapy and talked to them about it.  Of course, they said who was the nurse.  They aren't supposed to do that.  Also, they told me it is really typical for brain injured patients to bite on straws and cups.  Good to know!  Jessica said we will check it out.  She got fake pills and a cup of water, had Bridgett take a sip and swallow the pill and she did it the first time.  The second time, she swished the water in her mouth and the pill moved and she didn't get it down.  So, they changed the orders to say, sip of water, pill in back of mouth, remind her not to swish and down with the pill.  Bridgett is doing so much better this way.  When they gave the pills to her in applesauce, she'd either chew the pills (yuck) or swallow the applesauce and the pill still was left in her mouth.  Oh, this afternoon Courtney and her mom Penny came to visit.  Courtney is doing even better since we saw her last.  It is very inspiring to see her.  Penny brought me a couple of books, one of them was a beautiful Greg Olson book that Courtney liked to look at during rehab.  Another was a book written by a former BYU student that had a traumatic brain injury about 10 years ago.  It apparently addresses how she felt during this whole process.  Great reading I'm sure.  I'm excited to start it!  I missed occupational therapy while I was visiting withe them, but Stephany said that Bridgett put together a puzzle and did sorting of shapes correctly.