Since returning to the clinic I have been hesitant to try to identify changes in Cash right away. I want to keep an open mind and be observant but not draw conclusions. Dianne seems convinced that she sees improvements and she has certainly spent a great deal of time with him throughout his life. Still I try to reserve judgement.
I did, however, see a very nice bit of adaptive behavior today. Usually when Cash is in his walker he cruises straight into the open elevator but relies on me to turn his walker around so he can exit. Today for the first time I saw him manage a three point turn to head his walker facing the exit. I was impressed by his problem solving and awareness of how the elevator works.
One learned behavior that concerns me is that Cash has come to believe that the name for his music player is 'help' in sign language. And since we always ask, "Help with what?" I think 'withwhat' is its last name in his mind. While it is cute, we want him to know that the concept of asking for assistance can be applied to other things as well. Dianne looked up the sign for radio (index finger over pointer finger as the letter R then moved toward and away from the ear) and we are determined to make him use some approximation of this sign to get his radio (or 'blue music' as we call it). We'll see how it goes.
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