We are now 3 days into this. I am so grateful this was a mild stroke and that the connections are quickly re-forming and healing. We have had a GREAT day! Through this day I have realized, and Marty is starting to realize he hasn't really forgotten everything it's just VERY slow coming out. We don't have to re-teach him, he just needs to slow down and it will come.
During scripture study this morning we were reading from 1 Nephi 17. verses 18 & 19 say:
18 And it came to pass that as I, Nephi, went forth to slay food, behold, I did break my bow, which was made of fine steel; and after I did break my bow, behold, my brethren were angry with me because of the loss of my bow, for we did obtain no food.
19 And it came to pass that we did return without food to our families, and being much fatigued, because of their journeying, they did suffer much for the want of food.
Marty got so excited during these versus. He wrote:
- Lights off - Pray for Deer
In my effort to update all of yesterday's events, I spent about an hour on the computer. I didn't realize Marty had gotten up and gone to the bedroom. A bit later, he came and got me and pulled me into the bathroom. He had made the bed (though not complete it was wonderful), & sorted the laundry. He sorted the laundry as my clothes and his clothes. I told him we can wash our clothes together, we need to sort by type of material and color giving him examples. He then sorted again without an issue!
The first time I realized he could read was when starting the laundry. He pointed to the word "start" on the washer and looked at me for confirmation. He did get frustrated when pushing the start button didn't actually start the washer. I told him he needed to turn on the washer first. He looked and looked for the button. He finally remembered and pushed the power button. Baby steps!
Throughout the morning, I noticed Marty was keying in on smells. While washing his hands with Gingerbread hand soap left over from Christmas, he kept smelling his hands. Over and over smelling his hands. He then wrote:
- My NaNa made Houses with candy that smells like soap
While I was in the shower this morning, Marty went through the cabinets smelling all the lotions, body washes and perfumes. While showering he did the same thing to everything in the shower. A friend of mine told me that smells would help him, so I'm grateful that he is able to recognize this on his own.
When Marty was smelling the Gingerbread soap in the kitchen he was also able to remember Papa and Kay in the wheelchair. He also remembered Nana made an upside down german chocolate cake. (I decided to buy the stuff to make that for him too)
We had a few basic things that we needed from Walmart, so I decided we would venture out. Seeing that he really does remember a lot of things it just takes him a long time to recognize it, I decided I'd let him take the list and walk Walmart to find all the things on our list. I found out that he needs an exact list. I had cheese written on the list. That was quite confusing when he came to the cheese wall. One of the girls had written Diet Mountain Dew. When we got to the soda aisle and I stopped him in front of the Sam's choice soda's, he couldn't make the connection between Mountain lightening and Mountain Dew. We'll be much more precise in his lists going forward. Our list had 7 items on it and we were at Walmart for over 2 hours. YIKES!
When we got to the cash register, he took the money from my hand and wanted to pay. When the cashier told him his total, he slowly, meticulously pulled out one bill at a time until he had the total number of dollars. He was puzzled by the cents part. I pulled out a handful of change and he was able to pull out the exact change from my handful. I was in tears as he did that as yesterday the concept of money was so foreign.
On the way home, marty kept motioning that he wanted to talk. I said, then do it. He shook his head no. I encouraged him again and he shook his head no. I told him it will be hard, but he can do it. He just shook his head no.
When we got home, he walked to the pictures on the wall in the hall way. He pointed to Addyson and very strained, said "AAAAA EEEEEE". He then pointed to Jessica and "essss EEEEE" He pointed to Rylee and said "IIIIII EEEEE" He pointed at my picture and just kept looking at it and shaking his head. I was sobbing by this point. I said it's okay, my name is hard. He kept shaking his head and concentrating. A very strained Thank You came out. I could tell it was exhausting for him, but it meant a lot to him to be able to say just those few short words.
Marty had a lunch guest today. Clare Zebley came and joined him for lunch. He remembers Clare from the one Sunday that Marty was in nursery with her. When her dad came to visit last night, Marty asked for her to come visit. She really likes pepperoni on her pizza. When she had eaten all of her pepperoni and all of her dad's pepperoni, Marty remembered we had pepperoni in the refrigerator and went and got it for her. Funny things he'll remember sometimes.
Marty fell asleep on the couch after lunch. While sleeping he made a lot of sounds in his sleep. Nothing intelligible, but gibberish. When he I woke him up he looked disoriented. I asked if he was okay. He wrote "differnt" He then very quickly wrote:
- 5 Embelton Drive Bella Vista AR 72714
- 2007 Ford Freestar
- 2001 Mazda Miata
- 1999 Pontiac Grand Am
- Jon B-day -21 Jan, Judy -22 Jan
- Scott 27, Dad - 3 July
- Things just seem clearer
- I think I was talking in my sleep
- I had a dream that I was taking on the phone. I heard myself talk.
Words said to date
- Hi
- Addy
- Jessi
- Rylee
- Thank You - instead of my name - it's too hard
- Jon - when looking at a picture of Jon on facebook
- Tree - while driving through Bella Vista
- Hat - pointing to another person wearing the hat
- Car - when doctor conover asked him if he was using his exercise ball - he told him it was in the car
- Cori - when he saw Cori at the doctor's office
- Mom - just called to say hi
- Andy - when pointing to a wizard of oz calendar
- Becky - when remembering she cut(s) his hair
- Bye - saying goodbye to the primary presidency that came to our house for a meeting
- Becky cuts my hair (his sister was a beautician)
- Pecan Pie (Marty was flipping through a magazine and saw Kenny Rogers in it. He remembered "AAAA EEEE" had sung with him. He also remembered that we went to dinner before hand and he had the best pecan pie)
- She told me But I can't Remember (?????)
- Braum's (I asked Marty where he wanted to go after the doctor)
- T-shirts for scarfs (we passed by a thrift store that we had talked about buying t-shirts at a few weeks ago)
- cherry (??)
- Does she like to read? (while on the phone with his mom - we actually called his mom today and he said "hi mom")
- Listen (??)
- I saw your picture on the wall and I wanted to say your name (answer to one of the girls that asked how he learned to say their name)
- Did we make dinner together for our church (speaking to the Causey's who had served on the ward activities committee with us.
- On Sundays (??)
- Soup at Braums (there was a chicken enchilada soup with green chili at braums. He remembered that the Causey's like green chili)
- Her son speaks spanish (on a mission in Spain)
- Band
- Football games
- Your son goes there - full skolarship
- What do we usually eat?
- Peggy & Terri (Addyson's choir teacher and his wife)
- Works at church (referring to Peggy)
- Tevit & Brenden moped the flour (mopped the floor)
- Her son was in my nursery - Adam
- likes to hit stuff with hammer
- Walmart
- paying with money
- seeing the mountains
- getting ice from the ice dispenser
- sorting laundry
- washing laundry
- drying laundry
- folding and putting away laundry
- sucking a thick milk shake through a straw
- getting a cold milk shake
- going to a thrift store
- hearing the heater turn on
- cooking eggs
- cooking a pizza
Today has been AWESOME!
1 comments:
Wow! What a terrific day. I'm so glad you are chronicling his progress day-by-day. You both will be SO glad to have every little miracle recorded before the days blur into weeks and months and you forget how amazing each little achievement is. Thank you for sharing your experiences. The overwhelming love your family shares and the way you are facing this challenge with such faith, head-on is a testimony builder for all of us. We will continue to pray for more healing and miracles.
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