Waldemer Family

Friday, July 22, 2011

July Intensive PT

We just finished our first week of a 3-week intensive PT where she goes 4 hrs/5 days a week. This is where she lifts weights for 2 hrs, gets a short break, and then puts on a suit that has a lot of resistance to it, so it is difficult to walk and do functional activities, but as she works against the resistance she gets stronger. Alex did a GREAT job and worked really hard! The only time she really resisted was today towards the end of the session during sit-up time (her least favorite activity). She had quite a meltdown, but it only lasted 5 minutes or so, and she did a great job working through it and calming herself down. When she did choose an activity, she worked just as hard for the last half-hour as she did all week. We are very proud!

The hammock is Alex's absolute favorite thing--especially these "creepy spirals" she calls them. This is how we are ending every session.

Spider is not all fun and games. When the ropes are lower, they help Alex do exercises like squats and flamingo standing.

Fishing with Olivia

We went on a really cool outing for "special needs" kids at a fish hatchery in Washington last weekend. We got to fish out of a giant pool and the fish were quite large--Alex's biggest fish weighed in at over 6 lbs! We met up with Alex's friend Olivia there, who is 3 years old and also has CP. The girls are pretty similarly affected by their CP, so it is kind of cool that they have both similar abilities and challenges. And as an added bonus, her dad is a big hunter/fisher and was more than happy to do the dirty work for us! :)

House Pics

We are loving the new place! Alex walks around most of the time (as long as one of us is behind her) and seems to really like it.

Friday, February 25, 2011

Pulleys at PT

We just finished Alex's first ever week of intensive PT. Instead of doing PT once a week for one hour, she did PT 4 hrs a day each day this week (well, she ended up getting a day off due to snow of all things!). Alex worked really hard each day, and I was so proud to see her rise to the challenge. I think I already noticed some improvement in her balance when we went walking today, and while the week was not without some tears, Alex seems quite proud of herself for working so hard and getting stronger. I am very happy it went so well, and am excited for our 3-week intensive in July.

Each day, we started off with massage, stretching, and then Alex did exercises designed to isolate specific muscles by pulley exercises for a good hour and then we had a well deserved snack break every day.

On the first day, it was more of an evaluation/fun day, so Alex got to do a bunch of really fun things like go in the ball pit, play on a standing bike (Erin told us to think of it like a moving elliptical machine), and go on a swing.

On the other days, the PT first put a suit with lots of bungees strapped all over it. This suit both provides some additional stability and also some resistance, making it more difficult for her to turn her feet in when she walks.

One of the funnest things Alex did was "The Spider", where the PT puts Alex in a harness and then attaches bungees to two "cages" so Alex can jump unassisted by a person and do it safely. Alex had a great time, and seemed to make some improvement in her jumping over the 3 days we did it.

Day 1

Day 2: Jumping on a Bosu ball.

Day 3: Alex wanted to jump so badly that she stayed an extra half-hour to do it!

Another thing Alex did with the cage/bungee set up is walk on a treadmill. She thought this was great for all of 2 minutes. When we go walking now, Alex usually takes several steps and has lots of pauses (and she still loses her balance quite a bit). So the experience of continuous walking like that is quite new and will be something that takes some getting used to, I think.

Here are a couple of other various activities we did to keep things different and keep Alex's interest up.