lily, my SLT, and alice, my PT
hi there, some of you have mentioned that it takes forever for this page to load! i wanted you to know it’s the same for me. it takes forever for this site to open so it’s not very appealing for me to open it either! 
as for you leaving me comments, you just go to the bottom of each entry and it has a box where you can leave me comments, so please do! that way, i’m motivated to keep this updated, ok? 
i’ll be expecting TONS OF COMMENTS THEN!!!
let me show you my speech therapist, lily. 
she comes every morning to my room at 9:30am. she told me this morning that she’s on duty tomorrow also so i’ll have a speech therapy session on saturday also! yea! 
she’s from mongolia and she told me it takes her 33 hours by train to go home, so she only goes home twice a year. crazy stuff! she told me how much it costs on the train also. if she just gets a box seat, it’s the cheapest and costs about 240RMB. a plane ride costs 1800RMB and she said she cannot afford the plane so she takes the train and uses the sleeper bed. the soft, comfortable bed ride costs 700RMB, i believe she said. interesting stuff.
i really enjoy working with lily because she’s very enthusiastic and her english isn’t bad. she uses her cell phone to look up words. i also like that she teaches me chinese words in our sessions because she learned speech therapy in chinese and i don’t mind! i actually like having a chinese lesson in our sessions. she brought a japanese pop song this morning for part of our session. it’s good for me to start singing because it helps with my breath control also. so i’m very happy to be learning a song. i’m not very good at it though.
chinese learn songs through do re mi fa so la ti do, so they can just write 33 666 43231 and they can make sounds from the numbers. i had to write it down so i would remember what 4 is (it’s fa); 1 is do, 2 is re, 3 is mi, etc. you get what i mean, right? so the japanese pop song is called oriental cherry in english. lily has a great voice also, so it’s fun to sing with her.
i also have TCM (traditional chinese medicine) with mr. guan at 1:45pm; you can see his picture in the previous post. the point of TCM is to help keep my body relaxed and at ease, so because my back’s been hurting me, mr. guan has been doing a cupping massage on my back. then i turn over and he massages my neck and shoulder. wendy comes into my sessions because his english isn’t very fluent yet, so wendy comes in and translates for us.
i got dr. xi to take a picture of my back when the bandaid came off last weekend. no mark on my back of 2nd injection can you see? i’ll have to check after i post this blog.
***** no that doesn’t show, so here…
no mark, so that’s good! here are my IVs after my 2nd stem cell injection.
and i am the worst for the nurses since my veins are so bad; they keep having to stick me with needles because my veins go bad and they hurt because the IV liquid ends up going into my skin instead of my veins. i’m jealous because basil has only had his IVs stuck in 2 places!!! i think i’ve been stuck about 10-15 times already!!!
it’s in my
left arm now when yesterday it was in my left hand top. they have to keep changing places because my veins go bad.
walk into the rehab center.
that’s susan at the front desk in the center.
also i wanted to take a picture of alice, 
my physiotherapist; that’s an occupational therapy room. i used to see tony but i’m more comfortable with a female since ….well, it’s just more comfortable but i’ve learned that tony
is actually more experienced and stuff. alice is actually an occupational therapist however it’s still pleasant to have her as my physiotherapist. i’ll have to take a picture of her tomorrow to show you. (i put it in above.)
this is the doorway into the PT area.
if you walk in that way, you’ll see this.
that gadget tests your balance and equilibrium. i did it 4 times while i was in the hospital, and it’s interesting that it shows i favor my left leg and foot. i put more weight on my left side. that’s also probably why i was a left wing in soccer in high school. when alice and i play soccer on the balance board, i score more with my left foot too! 
this is the PT room.
from the other end of the room.
my brain stem injury caused me balance problems which is what alice works on with me. i first get stretched out and warmed up; alice moves my legs around to warm them up. then she has me do some balancing exercises to work me and then we go to the PT room which you can see above where tony is working on a patient.
i then get on the treadmill for 10 minutes. i choose to walk or run by myself…whatever i feel like. alice lets me do what i want. some days i feel like adding some running so i will. 
i like to work out on the treadmill
— get me sweating so i can stay in shape.
it’s cool they have a balance board
and i am thrown a ball and try to score. 
alice is by the door which acts as the goal 
and i’m good! hahaha i score between 8 and 10 a day with alice. she’s not a good goalie. hehe she also has me run/walk on the treadmill for 10minutes; i decide if i want to run or not. we also work with the big swedish balls to help me with my balance. i’ll have to take pictures so you know what i’m talking about tomorrow.
i am different from the other patients here because william and i live here in beijing part of the year, so we have an apartment here in wangjing, the korean area of beijing which is in northeast beijing. since isabelle, celine’s mother, invited some people from the hospital to go to a music show in wangjing last night, i went home to sleep instead of returning to the hospital. i just have to sign a leave permission form from the nurses so they are not responsible for any injury when i’m outside the hospital. i invited zsuzi to join me and she happily accepted since we have 2 bedrooms in our apartment.
i took some pictures of the group that went to the show entitled shadow so you can see here.
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2 comments June 3rd, 2007
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