Wednesday, May 03, 2006

Family meeting

There was a family meeting at 3pm with the speecha and language pathologist. Sol wanted to update the family about Jan's progress and activities. She is a good teacher: came prepared with all materials, clear explanations and an excelent explanatory method of complex matters. On top of that, she brought fruit, cookies and cheese to the meeting for the participants! I would give her a 100%. Too bad I am not her boss, so I will just wish she gets a raise.

Jan was very attentive throughout the whole session which lasted a bit over 2 hours. She participated like anyone else clarifying and adding to the explanations given. Great effort on her part and very satisfying for most members of the family to hear the great progress she has made in the last few weeks.

Jan is diagnosed with moderate to severe Expressive Aphasia; Moderate Apraxia, and mild Receptive Aphasia, which means that she has a long way to work on (1) rebuilding the connections betwen her ideas and the dictionaries in her head, (2) between knowing the words she wants to use and being able to make the mouth actually pronounce them and (3) decoding what people tell her, in particular if the surroundings are too noisy or there is more than one conversation at a time.

Whenever you are visiting, please make the point at the beginning of asking Jan for her communication binder where you can read a bit more on the strategies to communicate with Jan and where you can write those darn words that just refuse to show up in Jan's speech. If you want to have a satisfactory visit, you will have to learn the rules of engagement, or else you may end up having a monologue.

Admirable woman. Jan continues her struggle to get well. Lots of work. Great determination is expected. Strong faith. An open mind, and above all, a great capacity to love the gifts of life and rejoice in what she already has and is.

-Fede

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