Wednesday March 28

Post date: Mar 29, 2012 3:23:18 AM

Today I met with Martha's therapy team and they confirmed that Martha is continuing to progress really well. She is trying some different assistance devices -- various canes and walkers -- and seeing what works best for her. The team told me she is walking 500 feet, but even while I was there I saw her walk past us using a Rollator (rolling walker) twice, so the therapist assisting her agreed she had walked the 500 feet at least twice already today. She goes pretty fast, too. I told her we would have to see if we can get one with reflectors and a horn so folks can see her coming from far away. :-) Every day she seems a bit more consistent cognitively, too. She still gets time-disoriented sometimes, but she works hard to correct herself as soon as she realizes it. The therapy team says they think she still needs a couple of weeks of therapy before they would feel comfortable releasing her to an assisted situation.

Unfortunately things haven't gone so well for Amanda this week. She was really hopeful about the medication she started last week, but she began feeling strange Monday, and had serious reactions yesterday. Now she has had serious reactions to three different drugs in that class and realizes she probably can never take any of them. (She's disappointed because medical reports say the best outcomes for her condition come from taking one of those drugs plus other therapies.) She contacted her doctor first thing this morning and got in for an office visit this afternoon. They shared some ideas (since both of them have been researching therapies) and Amanda starts tomorrow on yet another drug. It will address the problem in a less direct way, so over the next several weeks we will see if that therapy (on top of all the non-medical therapies she is still using) will keep things under control as she gets better. Overall Amanda is still doing much better than she was a month or two ago, but every drug reaction feels like a big setback because her symptoms get worse and she feels rotten for a few days.