Mom had her swallow study done yesterday and she did GREAT! She didn’t cough one time. I’m so proud of her. The speech pathologist there basically cleared her for thin liquids, but with conditions. She has to be mindful about what she’s doing and be aware of the amount she’s taking in. She also needs to stick with nectar thick liquids (for now) to take her pills. We can definitely do that! She even tried a couple of foods that were giving her some problems but she had absolutely no issues during the test yesterday. One more obstacle cleared! Now her speech therapist can focus more on her language skills to reduce some of her slur (which really isn’t that bad) as well as focus on memory skills.
Cyndie made it into town today! She arrived this afternoon and was able to meet one of mom’s caregivers as well as watch mom with her speech therapy session. I was gone for most of the time but it looked like they had a nice afternoon. Once we were all home for the evening, we decided to head out to dinner. This is the first time that Cyndie has been out to eat with mom since all of this started. Guess where we headed…. RED ROBIN! I do like the food, but we know that mom can eat there without any problems. We’re still wanting to stick with what she’s comfortable with. I think the last two times we were there she coughed at one time or another. Today we had a cough-free meal. It was just a nice, normal evening out where we all ate entirely way too much.
Cyndie will be having “mom duty” for the next couple of days since she’s here to give me a break. 🙂 Mainly I hope that she and mom get some quality time together. I think just as much as I need a break as mom’s caregiver, I’m sure she needs a break from me too. It’ll be good for her to have someone different annoying her. Actually, tomorrow (Friday) will be a great day for Cyndie to be here. She’ll get to see mom walking with her therapist. I don’t think she’s seen her walk since she first came home. I bet she’ll be surprised to see her progress.
All in all it’s been a very good week. Hopefully the trend will continue into the weekend!