Day 23: A Full Friday

One of the unintended positive effects of this time in the IRU is the amount of time dedicated to daily activities during occupational therapy. Things like putting on socks and shoes, for example. We have worked on that for years, of course, but there are also a lot of occasions where we are trying to get everyone out the door and it's just easier to do it for him (same applied for Henry for years). It's good to see the patient, trained professionals working with Charlie on these things and giving him the time he needs.

There was an example of this for me this morning. We'd done our morning routine and taken a shower. I had put on his sandals (because I don't think this through very well) and we were ready to be collected.


(We were playing with the filters on the phone, which explains the balloon. The crossed arm thing is a Charlie original, I hope, and not some cult sign that he's picked up from the internet).

When the OT came to collect him at 9, she decided it would be best if he changed into his shoes and his orthotic supports. Of course it would. So, part 1 of OT this morning was changing into the correct footwear.

When he returned to the room in the late morning, he was walking and the team were using a trundle wheel (checks and confirms that is a UK phrase - inconclusive, so the original term can stay) and reported that he walked 234 feet! I was particularly impressed with how flat to the floor his feet were.

As I tried to articulate in other posts, the point of this surgery was to try and remove tone or tightness in his leg muscles that were having an effect on his ability to walk and on his muscles' ability to stretch and grow. This had been getting progressively worse and by the time of the surgery, he was walking on his tiptoes on the right side. Here's a clip of him walking before his surgery:

It was really great to see him with both feet flat on the floor and it's got me feeling very optimistic for him. 

He had some more PT in the later part of the day and he got to watch a movie in the Fun Zone while standing and doing squats in his stander. He was pretty tired by the end of the day so I decided to spare him some extra cycling. Besides, the Astros were playing the Yankees.

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