Hi Everyone,
Corey had a rough day but we were expecting it! It’s not uncommon to have a few bad days after a busy weekend of company, activity and/or travel. I haven’t begun my continuous family leave yet as I’m wrapping up some projects for my accounts. Unfortunately, I was on the road today and a wreck to hear of Corey’s bad day.
When I arrived home she was in her last session of therapy with Brittany, the school OT, and her Math teacher. That’s right, she has a Math teacher! Good news, Corey won’t be working on typical math lessons. Christa is going to work on ‘functional math’ such as measurements for cooking. Her brother is a chef and she’s borrowed his college book, ‘The Professional Chef’. Corey and Christa will be reading and cooking out of this book every week! The teachers have gone to Corey’s tech school to speak with Chef Young and Chef D to gather information on what we can do at home to prepare Corey to get back into the kitchen. There’s more Math in the kitchen than you think!
Brittany was asking Corey about her weekend. I love to watch Corey interact with her teachers and therapists. It fascinates me to see what they can pull out of her and what her responses are for them. Brittany asked Corey if she remembered where she went this past weekend. “New York”. What state do you live in? “PA” (she took the short cut on that one). Then she accurately wrote her age and birthday.
As I mentioned a few weeks ago, Dave from the IU and Brain Steps helped us find a large key keyboard. He is working with Brittany and Corey’s teachers on augmentative communication for her. She likes the larger keyboard but today Brittany uploaded a keyboard to the Ipad. Corey shocked us all. She was targeting the letters to spell her name, Caitlin JohnPaul and Papa’s name. These names required her to visually cross midline and manipulate the three lines of keys to search for the letters. Although she wasn’t 100% accurate with the target, she was darn close. The more we worked with the keyboard on the touch screen the more deliberate her motion became. Acquiring this fine motor control will be critical to her typing. Her touch is much softer, more like a tap instead of pushing her finger as if to touch the keys on a physical keyboard. This light touch in and of itself is a big improvement since we’ve been working with the Ipad.
By the end of the session and for the balance of the evening, Corey was much more content. She had a quiet night as we enjoyed reading the carepage, facebook and watching Cake Boss before she settled in and fell asleep.
Corey I keep an assortment of Motivational books at my bedside. One of my favorites is Motivational Quotes compiled by Mac Anderson. Tonight I randomly opened the book and the quote that presented itself to me was;
It’s never too late to be what you might have been ~ George Elliot
After reading this I thought about Christa reading to you. I thought about Chef Young and Chef D advising us on how to prepare you for the day you’ll walk back into the kitchen at your culinary school. I pictured you going to the book store to buy your culinary books one day. It’s exciting to think about that day and picture you in your chef’s coat and hat. You are working hard to make that happen. Each day you show us something new that will help you get closer to that dream. We keep looking at what you’ve accomplished in just the last 6 months but I think this quote is the perfect focus on what we can look at from today on. But I think we’ll switch it up a bit. It’s not “what you might have been”…it’s “who you are and all that you have yet to achieve”! I’m so proud of you, xoxo