Tuesdays with Lauren...(visit 3)

OK. OK. I know I neglected to post right after my last visit...Now that we have that out of the way, let me update you on our visit from 5/22/12.

Lauren is enjoying her Brain Lab app and requests to play it often.  Yay!  Her mom even said that sometimes, L reads the instructions so fast that she (mom) doesn't even get a chance to figure it out. HA. Go Lauren!

I had a surprise for L this day as I had spent a wonderful Saturday, with a "bestie" celebrating my birthday, getting our make up done, shopping, eating and giggling. As we were enjoying our day, I was reminded how therapeutic it is to enjoy new hair, makeup and nails (if you enjoy these things of course!) 

Each week when I arrive at L's house her hair is done differently and her nails are painted a new color so I had decided, while planning therapy, that I would incorporate some of these "girl treats" into our session. Although I didn't know L prior to her accident, I can tell from her pictures that she very much enjoyed "pampering" items.  I had so much fun shopping for head bands, nail polish, CHOCOLATE, lip gloss and gum.

I told L that I had some surprises with me but to get them, she had to guess what they were, in two guesses, based upon my clues. This was not only a lesson in comprehension but also practice using her alphabet board and Verbally app (on iPad) to communicate her thoughts.  So, here is how it went with the alphabet board...

Don't you just love her Cookie Monster T-Shirt? You can see that, while L is comprehending much, there are still times that she might "get stuck" on previous thoughts. This is one of the reasons we do these types of exercises...to get her to really tune in to the minute details and stay focused into my voice and our activity. 

One of the things I want you to really pay attention to is that L makes the motor (mouth) movements for words...this is VERY encouraging. We continue to work on voicing but this will take some time as she can not always get "voice" when she wants it.


Thanks for reading! Remember that you can visit on of the links below to donate or keep up with Lauren's story.
http://www.caringbridge.org/visit/laurenpokuta  or http://staystrong4lauren.com/Until next time....Jen