September Update

It has now been almost 5 weeks since Cheryl's stroke. She was at Sacred Heart Hospital for about 2 1/2 weeks. Once she was medically stable, the hospital discharged her. The family made the decision that having mom on the west side of the mountains would be very advantageous for all, and so she was transported via ambulance to a skilled nursing facility nearer home two weeks ago. Although mom still does not have use of her right side or any language, we have seen many improvements, most recently including some swallowing, conversation comprehension, following some simple directions and things like that. We continue to hold hope that as the blood dissipates from the brain, that further progress will be made. We have been traveling to visit as often as possible to encourage mom in her recovery efforts and give her incentive to make progress! For anyone who would like to better understand brain functioning and how a stroke affects the brain, we recommend the book "My Stroke of Insight" by Jill Bolte Taylor. This book is written by a brain scientist who suffered a stroke. It really opened our eyes to brain functioning and what mom might be experiencing. We continue to update the Caring Bridge blog a couple of times per week (http://www.caringbridge.org/visit/cherylread). The love and support for mom has been so encouraging for us.

In other news - our family is adjusting to middle school (Natalia) and both girls are settling into the school routine. Natalia has passed the 5 foot mark and is rapidly catching up to mom! Piano lessons are back on the schedule as are any high school football games that we can make it to!

I'll post their first day of school pictures too! Johanna - 4th grader

Natalia - 6th grader