Dear Ones,

(In the past I did not like this salutation, but now I feel it really fits.  Especially if you put the emphasis on Dear.)

Happy New Year - let this be a good one for you.  Beginnings, a fresh start, beginners mind, all have the promise of hope and new perspectives. I wish this for you. 

Matt has had some ups and downs recently. The two places he felt would be good rehab choices fell through and now we are patching therapies together with two different rehabs,  2 private and 1 through UCLA.  This includes PT, OT, Speech. Matt continues to work on his most difficult deficit: balance.   He has made progress in this area as we are able to walk in the house with his walker without any assistance (no hands on), but I am right behind him. 

There is also a promising program called Project Relate, which seeks to take his own speech patterns and mix it so he can record and be understood. This is exciting as Siri has not been able to understand him and it has delayed his communications with folks.  It is quite an undertaking as he has to record 500 sentences that will decipher his particular speech sounds. So when he goes to record something (emails, texts, papers, etc.) it will understand him. If this is successful, Matt will most likely begin to think about next steps. 

The big news just this morning is that Matt took his shower completely on his own! He undressed, got into the shower, stood to turn on the water, sat right down and showered.  I wasn't even in the room! This is real progress! 

And, if you're wondering about help with driving, yes, there is a person we have hired to drive Matt. Yay!

Once again, I would like to express my appreciation to those tracking Matt's progress and to those whose support we could not have done without.  The love coming our way has absolutely contributed to Matt's progress. Thank  you. 

With lots of love,

Elizabeth