If the Saskatchewan Roughriders had Isabel's cheerleaders leading the way this weekend we know who would be the victors at the Labour Day Classic! Read carefully, you Winnipeg Blue Bomber fans!
Isabel has an amazing cheerleader squad of 5 physiotherapists and an occupational therapist who have encouraged Mum to make great progress in the last three days. After three weeks on her back, the team helps Mum to sit up and she can sit on her own for one minute. She can lift her legs up and down with some help. She does 30 minutes of exercises each day. (I wish I could say the same!) Mum has been sitting in a chair (with supports for her head and body) for an hour each of the last three days. She can hold her cards to look at them while we read them.
Mum continues to use a ventilator to breathe, and her lungs are slowly getting stronger. She does not have spoken words, however, she can tell us family birth order of her students from 50 years ago as we read cards and letters. Mum tells us who is related to whom through the questions we ask her. She can communicate the ANSWERS through nods, shakes, and eye movements. We just have to get the QUESTIONS right!
Mum's progress this week is due to her determination, and the caring and enthusiastic support of nurses and her amazing physiotherapy team whose cheers of her daily progress can be heard up and down the hall. The lead physio is so in tune with Mum. She knows that Mum is an excellent horseback rider. The focus of Mum now finding "her centre" and being able to sit tall on her own is remembering how to ride a horse. One of the other physios is an experienced rider as well, and the conversation focuses on horse talk.
Tomorrow I will add another big photo to Mum's wall. It is of Isabel riding 'Dixie Belle' when she won the Best Rider of Show at the Saskatoon Exhibition in 1944.
We're all along for the ride! Go Riders Go!
Catherine
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