It has been almost 6 weeks since Ben fell off of his longboard.
Today at Primary Children's Medical Center, he began testing for his rehab. While we have been really grateful for the progress he has made, it has been sad to see how far he has to go.
First, we started off with a Barium-swallow test, which takes an x-ray of your throat as you swallow to see if fluid goes into your lungs. Ben is able to handle solid foods, we found, but he had trouble with normal liquids like water, so he has been put on a "thickened liquid" diet, along with any solid foods. The thickener that they use gives water, soda, or juice a consistency more like Jello, so that it goes down the throat a little more slowly.
Second, Ben had a speech therapist come in, and she tested his cognition levels. It was obvious that he had problems with word associations, understanding stories, and recalling information, so we'll have a lot of work to do at that level. I've heard from others that it may take months for him to begin functioning on a normal level, so I expected this.
Then we had his occupational therapist come in and do some strength training and coordination exercises. Ben did pretty well on that, and he is supposed to go down to the gym in a bit, but he is suffering from a bad headache, and just wants to rest.
We had several visitors today, including a young boy of six who had a bull stomp on his head a couple of weeks ago. The boy played his violin to help cheer Ben up.
So I have two pictures today--one of the Barium swallow test, and one of Ben's private concert.
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