Sunday July 19

Today was a great day for John. We arrived and began spending time with him to give Holly a chance to get back and get cleaned up for her return later in the day. He continues to love to be outside and feed the numerous birds around. We were taking him back up to his room for lunch when we noticed that the gymnasium door was open. There are a lot of different machines and I found a basketball and handed it to him and his face lit up like you would not believe. He dribbled the ball and even passed it to us as you will see in the pictures.

I should mention that I have terrible hand eye coordination so I'm pretty sure he was a bit frustrated with my skills but luckily Kara played ball in high school and they passed the ball quite a bit and he lobbed the ball to her several times as an assist to make baskets. I think that using photographs at this point speaks volumes when words can't so this is a collection of photographs taken today. Tonight, Holly took Chanel (Paulette's Boston Terrier) up to see John and although we don't have photos, he held his arms out and gave her lots of kisses and held her and seemed really excited to see her.

John will continue another week of intensive therapy which should prove to give him even more strength. His sessions become more difficult as he progresses and provide a challenge to him to get his muscle movement and mass a chance to develop. He makes an impact on those around him each day including staff, patients, and of course us.