Tuesday (Apr. 2) Update from Annapolis

Greetings, family!

Here's an update on today's visits with Grandma. Grandpa has been sending additional details throughout the day; please feel free to ask any questions you have! AS AN UPDATE, the "Care Conference" we planned to attend today actually took place yesterday (the visit from April, from social services). The big, official "Care Conference" is scheduled for this Friday, April 5. This meeting will include Grandma's therapists, nurses, etc. who will provide input on Grandma's recovery.
-Elizabeth

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HIGHLIGHTS from Tuesday, April 2:

• Grandma began the day with some drowsiness, yet worked with the Occupational Therapists to stand using parallel bars as support
• She received a visit from Andrea Lev, an administrator at Heritage Harbour Rehab Center, who gave her some encouragement
• Grandma saw the Physical Therapist/Occupational Therapist and lifted some 1/2-pound and 1-pound weights on both arms!
• Dr. Chopra (spelling?) visited Grandma with the Head Nurse (Anina)
• The "Care Conference" is scheduled for Friday, April 5 -- we misunderstood the date
• Grandma requested we bring magazines and picture books for her to look at

Details:

Today was another day filled with challenges and great recovery milestones. We learned that the Speech Therapist visited early in the morning to begin Grandma on her pureed diet (ie., moving away from the liquid nutrition from a tube). However, Grandma was a little drowsy this morning, or "dopey" as she describes. For this reason, the ST delayed the start of her puree diet. Perhaps related or unrelated, there is a sign above Grandma's bed today (posted April 2) that reads: "Pt. is NPO! No food or drinks please."

Like yesterday, Grandma went with the Physical/Occupational Therapists in a wheelchair again, this time learning to push the wheels along herself. She also gave a go at trying to move herself in the wheelchair using her feet. Once in the therapy room, Grandma was helped up to stand at these new parallel bars - a different set of equipment than yesterday's standing exercise. She did great, but I think she was feeling the effects of drowsiness still and may have appeared a bit bewildered. In either case, she showed big bravery, and Grandpa encouraged her!

After returning to her room and bed, we had a visit from Ms. Andrea Lev, one of the administrators (or perhaps "the" administrator) at Heritage Harbour Rehab Center. She was very nice, and took time to listen to Grandma as she described how she was feeling. She also was very intentional about sharing that Grandma was making big progress. Grandma shared more doubts that she would recover, but Andrea urged her to keep trying. "You have some wonderful support from your family, and the therapists here are great and can get you moving again," she told Grandma.

One observation that Grandpa and I made was that Grandma appears to be able to read just fine. She took a careful look at the cards from some of her friends that arrived this week, which perked her up.

Despite showing short-term memory challenges related to reporting her age, the year, etc., Grandma acknowledges these challenges and recognizes when she might be mistaken. Today, she was under the impression that she was 100 years old. She also has some difficulty remembering conversations from a previous day, or something she sees on TV earlier in the morning.

I notice that Grandma is very close to her normal self when she is feeling perky. She becomes very conversational, asks Grandpa and me questions, nods, points, raises her eyebrows - even cracks some jokes! She has been comfortable listening and speaking Dutch and German. She said "bonne nuit" and "a demain" (good night and see you tomorrow in French) to Grandpa and I when we left this evening. All very impressive!

When chatting about her recovery and healing process today, she told us: "It's difficult, but it's the way it is."  She also said, "I see things I used to do, and now I cannot do them." These include movements like standing on her own and eating her normal meals. She likes to hold Grandpa's hand when she feels discouraged.

We notice she fluctuates between feeling positive/accepting vs. discouraged about her condition.

Indeed, even the smallest interaction during the day can make the difference between these two outlooks. Today, Grandpa gently asked Grandma to repeat the following phrase: "Every day, in every way, I am getting better." With love in her eyes, Grandma sweetly repeated this sentence. When Grandpa described a visit to the Hearing Aid office later this month, Grandma said: "I'll come along with you!" I think a small and emerging part of her is beginning to see her progress.

Speaking of progress, Grandma "wowed" us all when a sweet Physical/Occupational Therapist (Trish) visited Grandma for some weight exercises in bed. First, she lifted a 1-pound pole above her head with her left arm. She did several repetitions. Perhaps the first shocking milestone was that while she was lifting this pole above her head, she lifted her right arm (the weak arm after the stroke) to her nose to itch it!! That was truly impressive to all in the room. Next, Trish strapped a 1/2-pound weight to her right arm and she began to lift that arm as high as she could with the weight on. She did so well! Last, with 2 strap-on weights on each arm, Grandma lifted both arms simultaneously. Trish showed Grandma some resistance exercises that we can help her with - placing our hands on Grandma's right (weaker post-stroke) arm and asking her to push against us - either out, up, backward, or inward. These will make all the difference in helping her regain strength.

Trish gave Grandma a special apparatus to squeeze to rebuild the muscles in her left hand. "Please squeeze it 40 times," Trish said. Grandma did it very quickly, and even showed off a bit by doing more than 40 squeezes! I helped her to count the repetitions. By the end of the session, the therapist was laughing and saying the Grandma was making huge progress. Apparently when Trish first saw Grandma 1 week ago, the most she could do with her right (weaker post-stroke) arm was shrug her shoulders. Go Grandma!

The last activity before leaving Grandma in the evening was a visit from Dr. Chopra (Grandma's doctor) and Anina, the Head Nurse at the Rehab Center. They seemed to be pleased with Grandma's progress, and both expressed a desire to see Grandma's catheter removed soon.

I asked Grandma's nurse for the evening, Fatima, about the white sticker on her left arm. I learned that this is a Clonidine patch for blood pressure which is changed once every week. Tomorrow this patch will be changed and a new one will be placed on her arm.

Grandpa is now visiting (after dinner) with Grandma to bring her some clean t-shirts/laundry and some picture books and magazines to look at. Grandma said she was "bored" occasionally so we are looking forward to providing future entertainment for her! Social services also offers activities. We may look into those.