(Originally posted March 1, 2009)

It's so hard not to hover around J.J. right now. He's shown that he can make it up and down the stairs easily, but it scares me half to death to let him do it alone. He made his own breakfast (granted, it was only microwave pancakes, but he still had to figure out how long to put them in and which buttons to press in which sequence on the microwave) and I had to resist the urge to watch as he did it to make sure he wasn't going to burn the whole place down. Every time he stands up, I ask where he's going. I know he's got to be getting tired of the extra attention, but he's putting up with it. For my part, I'm trying to give him enough freedom to start feeling a little more normal while balancing that against my need to keep him safe. I know this will continue to get better.

Having J.J. home has made a big difference in his speech. He's been able to communicate with me a lot more. He's even managed to log into his computer (I didn't know the password--he's figured it out, although it took him a few tries to remember it) but is still having trouble reading well enough to do much with it. This is all connected with the trouble he's had with his speech; the area of J.J.'s brain most impacted by his stroke is called Broca's area (http://http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Broca%27s_Aphasia). Reading comprehension is sometimes impacted by damage to this area. It's coming back, kind of like with his speech, but is a little slower to recover because J.J. is not reading as much as he's speaking. He is able to read sentences, phrases and paragraphs, but when confronted with pages of written material he gives up. Some of this is also a concentration issue--it's not even quite two weeks since the stroke, and he's still very tired.

He's been making jealous noises when I type or read. I keep reminding him that it won't be long until he'll be doing everything again--he just needs to be patient. Looking back at the entries I made last week at this time, I can't believe how far he's come. By next week at this time, I bet his reading will be significantly better.

Our kids will be home at about 3:00 today. J.J. can't wait to see them. I can't wait to get Eli to clean up his room so I can sweep it. Whoever invented Legos obviously was not a mother.