What is on Your Spring Bucket List?

Do you make a list of things you want to do each season? How about planning what you want to do during the rest of you life?

 I am often thrilled to get the weeks meals planned but planning special activites for the next few months gives me joy and something to look forward to. It has been a long winter and I am so excited to enjoy warmer weather!


I do love making lists!

 I am always making lists. Groceries lists, "To Do Today" items, things I need to do for work events, things I want to get organized, empowering activities for good mental health, are just part of making everyday life work.   There is also my continual list of  "How I plan to lose weight and get fit," plus keeping track of banking, bills and medical needs.  There is even a need to keep track of family members events such as when we need to go to grandkids school and dance performances.

When I had the brain injury my memory took a significant downward dive and lists were the only thing that kept my mental memory wheel from spinning out of control in an endless loop. When in doubt I tried to remember to check the list. As I recovered and my memory improved, I found that I was busier than ever and therefore had a lot more to remember, so I still needed my lists!
The best lists for me are the ones where I plan out the fun activities or make steps toward goals that make me happy or feel proud of what I am accomplishing. A new season is indeed a fantastic time to think ahead to all you have to look forward to in the coming months.


What is a "Bucket List" anyway?

Yes! This is indeed a topic on the internet!  Basically, the idea is that most of us wish to enjoy meaningful experiences in our lifetimes and the point of a bucket list is to get out there and do it before we die or "kick the bucket." Some people think immediately of exotic destinations they long to see and activities that go with it. Others think of personal accomplishments such as learning a musical instrument or a different language or maybe becoming a public speaker or owning their own business. Others might have dreams of setting up a lasting legacy.. a building that lasts beyond them or setting up a scholarship for deserving students or perhaps ensuring that their grandchildren will have a nest egg to help them have the future that they will someday dream about.
A bucket list can be as big or small as you want it to be and it is flexible. You can add to it or remove items from it - after all, it is about you and your dreams! Your bucket list can help give you some direction and purpose. You can ask yourself what your purpose in life is or you can figure out what all you love in this world. It sets out a unique set of goals that are truly meaningful to you, and once you set that goal, you can start to organize how you might actually realize your dreams.

 You do have to remember that beyond the big goals and important moments are made up of smaller steps and special moments. Don't forget those big goals, but also don't forget to enjoy all the wonderful times and to celebrate the everyday pleasures and experiences.


I am looking forward to a few upcoming special events.

• In a few weeks, I will attend the Manitoba Girl Guide Conference in Brandon for a weekend.
• A remarkably large selection of Guiding activities are coming up this Spring in my district. They include everything from an adult award dinner we are planning to youth activities such as hosting a large Mother's Day Tea to a camp, a park clean-up plus so much more!
• We have our Scandinavian Choir Concert on May 13th.
• My husband and I are celebrating our 40th Anniversary this July, and we are planning on making it special.
• I expect to have an opportunity to visit with my oldest daughter who is currently living out of the province.
• In September I am hosting a week-long gathering of members from an online group I participate in called Christmas to the Max.
•  We are hoping to get some major work done at our cottage and get a chance to really enjoy it this year!

A lot of my planning is centred around these highlights, but I still need to plan on some just plain

FUN STUFF! Things that make good memories!

Linda's Spring List!

• Work on Painting watercolour pictures.

• Create a relaxing corner for me to relax and be creative

• Make  Easter cards with my new painting skill.

• Participate in a 30 day watercolour painting challnge.

• Celebrate Earth Day by starting some seeds.

• Go to the big garden center to buy the above seeds

• Buy a new Easter outfit.

• Bake a special bread for Easter

• Make some crafts about Butterflies for work and for home.

• Make some marmalade for the first time in decades.

• Have a picnic in the park.

• Go out for a special dinner and a movie.

• Read a good novel

• Create paper birds to hang in trees or making lanterns.

• Make art pieces out of natural items.

I love comments! 

Please tell us about your Spring projects or adventures!

Creating Art

This past week we had an Art Show for the Art Group I coordinate at the Stroke Recovery Association of Manitoba.

We get together every Wednesday morning at the Stroke Recovery center. We put out lots of different art supplies and participants are able to work on anything they want to. This is certainly not an art class but an opportunity for self expression. Some enjoy the details and work on the same project for a period of weeks while others might produce several pieces in a morning.  I try to offer a new idea, technique or medium each month and encourage participants to give it a try. You never know when something new might turn out to be an activity you will love doing. The creative arts have a special role in helping us find joy and well being in our lives.

The group was originally organized by an Art Therapist and focused on a psychological therapeutic model. When she left the group continued on as a social and peer support group that enjoyed creating art. Eventually I began to help with the group. As a Recreation Therapist I try to support the social, emotional, cognitive and physical needs of the group members but always... enjoyment and fun need to be the priorities at our art mornings.

I try to encourage participants to try new things and engage in learning new skills.  We try to use weaker hands and eyes to gain improved control and strength and we try to work on any left neglect issues that might have occured with strokes.

Decision making, focusing attention, spatial processing, sequencing and planning as well as other cognitive skills can begin to improve as we work on creating art. We assist individuals in trying new tricks and adaptive methods to reach their goals. Something as simple as using painters tape can keep the art paper from sliding away and a Masonite board can increase options for supporting the paper at different, more comfortable angles, kind of like a clipboard. That painters tape can even result in an attractive border strip around a painting!

We share our friendship. We express ourselves through conversation and also with our art. We create. We share our accomplishments and we feel proud of what we achieve.

P.S. One of the ladies at the art show said I needed a picture of me at the art show. I was trying to get pictures of my artists but had not even thought of getting a picture of myself. The picture above was Vera's first attempt to take a picture with a phone and I think it is wonderful!

Today was a Good Day

I have been asked questions lately that made me realize I should clarify what it is that I am training to do!

Therapeutic Recreation, according to the US National Therapeutic Recreation Society, is

"Practiced in clinical, residential, and community settings, the profession of Therapeutic Recreation uses treatment, education, and recreation services to help people with illnesses, disabilities, and other conditions to develop and use their leisure in ways that enhance their health, independence, and well-being."

The idea is to assist with activities, other than basic living skills (ADL'S), that promote some one's well being and that includes ones physical, cognitive, or emotional health.

 

We are to help with socialization, physical activities, creative expression and to support peoples spiritual needs and so much more.

 

Some people work with special needs kids, some people work with veterans,  adults with intellectual or physical challenges, and even prison populations sometimes have a Recreation Therapist.

 

I am learning to work specifically with Older Adults. I might work in a personal care home, hospital or a place for assisted living / independent living or maybe a charity or support organization in my community.

 

 

Today I led a craft with a group of seven elderly women who face a lot of challenges.

We made a nice floral arrangement.
We sat and chatted. I kept guiding the conversation to encourage thinking about spring and encourage cognitive skills.  We reminisced about the first signs of spring from when they were younger. I played some YouTube nature bird songs to encourage sensory recall.

 

The ladies expressed their creativity when they picked the kinds of greenery they wanted to include and choose where to put bows, butterflies and a little decorative birds. They smiled and were proud of what they made.

I helped push or walk them and their basket to their rooms where they made a decision about where to set their pretty new arrangements.  One lady wanted it put where she would see it every morning when she woke up.

 Next they went into the common room to get some cuddles with a therapy dog.

Today was a good day.
 

 

 

First Course Complete

One final exam is now over and the next course with the same instructor begins Monday.  Foundation in Therapeutic Recreation was our first class and the idea was to get us exposed to different concepts about the field.

A major feature of the course was that we went to observe 7 different programs for older people and then we filled out huge sets of questions about things we observed at the location. We visited personal care homes, adult day programs and a lovely independent living facility. We talked with the Recreational Therapists running the programs about their jobs and the joys and challenges they faced in their particular work.
 

I was at a Girl Guide event where we had
a MARSHMALLOW roast

I was really interested in seeing how the programs were handled and I could not believe how different they all were. I had fun watching a music program, and observing a really fun version of exercise combined with some cognitive prompting. (Stretch the rubber resistance band toward the west coast to Vancouver.. now let's aim toward Halifax on the east coast.)

One highlight was the hands on opportunity to help out at a day program when a petting zoo came to visit. The bunnies and chickens were carried around the circle for everyone to pet and I sat talking to several different interesting older people. I was amused to find that while my younger classmates were getting comments about yes nice and soft pets.  I was getting the older people telling me that these fancy breed chickens were too scrawny to cook and then several of them shared recipes about the best way to cook rabbits. So much for that cuddly petting zoo idea!

One of the lovely but still slightly disconcerting aspects of several of these visits was that so many of the residents looked at my cane and my graying hair and warmly welcomed me as a new participant and member of their group. I guess I look like I belong.

The final exam was not that hard but I really did need to take a lot of extra time to complete it.  Word recall is still very much an issue for me. Matching or fill in the blank questions were great and  I really don't think the essay questions went all that badly but darn that word recall problem when I needed specific terms. Somewhere in the extra time I was allowed because of my disability, I had the most of the "missing words" pop back in my mind. I was talking to one of the girls in the class yesterday about how I went to a bonfire cookout and I told her we had smore's and that I had roasted a mushroom on a stick. I looked at her confused expression and realized that I did not say "marshmallow".  I told her with a tiny touch of embarrassment...." and that  is part of what they mean when they are talking about aphasia".

 Exhaustion and stress bring on some of my symptoms that were bigger issues a year or two ago.
... Being exhausted and stressed is part of the definition of being a College Student.

Sorting Papers

I am sorting through recipes, scraps of paper with addresses, magazine articles and greeting cards and a lot of notes that were written to jog my faulty short term memory. During the first couple of years after I got sick I  picked up every health care pamphlet and every more or less inspirational message I could find.

With my wavering cognitive abilities at the time I had trouble determining what to keep and what to throw out so I kept a lot of boxes and zip lock bags full of random items. I did not know who or what to believe in as I experienced the uncertainty of my illness. I did find a lot of comfort in my religious beliefs.

Today I found a little scrap of brown paper, torn from the corner of a fast food bag, where I had written the words:

 

"Kyrie Eleison- Down the road that I must travel".

I have no recollection of writing this little note to myself but it still resonates very strongly with me. Life can be a pretty hard road with a lot of uncertainty and fear but here are lots of wonderful joyous moments too. Kyrie eleison... means Lord have Mercy and is part of the church services I have attended since childhood.

The song I will have remembered these words from  is Kyrie
The lyrics are by John Lang and the music by Richard Page and Steve George and were performed by Mr Mister.

Kyrie eleison, down the road that I must travel
Kyrie eleison, through the darkness of the night

I also especially like the lyrics-- my heart is old, it holds my memories. These boxes of papers are not going to fill in my confused memories from that period of my life. The things that are important to know are already held within my heart.





The wind blows hard against this mountain side,
across the sea into my soul
It reaches into where I cannot hide,
setting my feet upon the road

My heart is old, it holds my memories,
my body burns a gem like flame
Somewhere between the soul and soft machine,
is where I find myself again

Kyrie eleison, down the road that I must travel
Kyrie eleison, through the darkness of the night
Kyrie eleison, where I'm going will you follow
Kyrie eleison, on a highway in the light

When I was young I thought of growing old,
of what my life would mean to me
Would I have followed down my chosen road,
or only wished what I could be

Surviving the College Course

I have been a busy person for the past couple of months. I am looking into employment and retraining options for the future with the help of SMD (the Society for Manitobans with Disabilities) and this has led me on several adventures over the past year but the past two months have brought the largest set of challenges. I went back to school and I also started volunteering at a hospital to gain work experience.

I completed the ten-week college course in Interpersonal Communication that I started in January. How did that turn out? I don't have the final mark yet but I expect to have passed comfortably.  I completed 4 short papers and wrote two exams. The first half of the course was an exercise in fitting in and getting back in the grove. I quickly became aware of some major learning problems that did not exist before my health issues started. I used to read a lot and be able to easily remember what I read or heard. That is just not easy anymore. The course had a rather good textbook that was set up with an accompanying online version of the text and a lot of extra study aides available online and boy did I need them.

The teacher is a nice guy with a true desire to educate his students. 

In class there were a lot of small group activities and he managed to let me stay put and have the small group come to me so I didn't need to get up and down all the time. The class room was a very "busy" place from a sensory point of view. There was a heater going, a buzz from the lights and a lot of wiggly classmates. I picked a seat to the left side of the room near the front and that helped a lot since I seem to see and hear a lot better when the action is to my right "good" side.  I had trouble catching everything the teacher was saying, especially if he turned his back to write on the board or talked faster when he got passionate about a topic. He has his own issues with hearing loss and was understanding and more than willing to make every effort to accommodate me.

I found that, even though I usually feel like my language skills and short-term memory are adequate for everyday life now, my language skills fell apart when I needed to learn so many new terms. The course had about 25 fairly complicated vocabulary words a week and I was really struggling. I understood the concepts but word retrieval was absolutely eluding me.  Even if through some miracle I recalled the new word, I might have trouble actually articulating it during class, sort of like a stutter. 

The saving grace for me was that the online resources had a lot of games like memory matching games. …find the card with the word and march with a card with the definition. There were vocabulary crossword puzzles, vocabulary sheets, examples of videos using the skills, and practice tests for each chapter. I worked so hard!! Even with all that my recall was extremely hit and miss. The reason I will have done okay on the exams is because the exam format was multiple choice.  Aha! Apparently I can recognize the word and understand it.  On-line practice fill in the blank tests were miserable.  My midterm exam mark with multiple choice was great.

Reading the textbook was a massive challenge too. I have worked and worked over the past 4 years to get my reading level back up again but it is still difficult.  The muscles in my face do not work evenly so my left eye tracks across the page slower than my right and with a little bounce. Reading this photo rich textbook, for content, was taking me as much as 7 hours actual reading time to get through 30 pages and for every hour of reading I would need to stop and rest my eyes for another hour in order to recover from the growing headache and accompanying nausea. 

The partial solution to the reading issues was that online version of the textbook. I had my textbook open with a highlighter pen in hand and I had my computer read the words to me. [On my MAC you highlight the text you want read and then hit Option plus Escape]. I highlighted anything in the book that I needed to review later in order to work on remembering or comprehending the material. I closed my eyes and listened through examples and basic information.

The formatting style of the textbook made this difficult too. The computer reads straight down the page as printed, including tables and pictures stuck in the middle of text passages. This is also not easy because you can't take your time when reading the hard concepts -- the computer voice plods on with or without you.

I still hope to go to college and take more courses in September but I am starting to become aware of how many barriers I will be facing. I have an appointment with a Disability Counselor/ Social Worker at the college to discuss my options for modifications or assistance in the future. Next time I might not get a multiple-choice exam!

The volunteer experience component of my back to work program overlapped with the last two weeks of the college course. My ability to study and focus plummeted and fatigue won out. I am sure my second terms marks will reflect my exhaustion.

Am I glad I did the course? You bet!

I found it hard to keep to the page limit in the papers I had to write for class. I always want to write too much!

Therefore...

I will save writing about my volunteer experiences for another day!

Me? Going Back to School?

 I have been keeping busy with all kinds of different activities but my main focus has been to gradually progress toward getting back to work. 

I was accepted into a re-employment program a year and a half ago and we have been trying to find out what would be a good job for me now. I did aptitude testing, I took a computer course through them and I have gone with my job coach to interview a variety of people about what their jobs are really like. 

The re-employment program is currently trying to find somewhere for me to volunteer in order to get some real life experience and investigate what might be a good field for me. They want me to volunteer or job shadow for about 12 to 15 hours a week for a minimum of a month in order to prove that I could eventually work part-time. It is possible that if I meet these requirements I might qualify for some government education subsidies.

Last October my case manager and I met with a Disability Counselor at our local community college. We talked about the option of my entering a program at the college and we had a good discussion about what kind of supports I could expect from the college. I also told her the program that was most interesting to me is a certificate program called Recreational Facilitator for Older Adults and we discussed how employable I might be after completing the program.

They have made recent changes and that Rec Facilitator program is no longer being offered on a part time basis so the only way I can get the certificate will be by going to college full time for 9 months starting next September.  It turned out that a couple of the classes I would need to take were offered in other part time programs and the counselor suggested that I take one course and see how it goes. If I do go on next year it would be transferred over and it would make next year a little bit lighter. Everything looks very promising, but I must admit that the thought of being a full time student is very daunting to me.

I am currently taking a course called Interpersonal Communication. The class is from 6:00 to 10:00  one evening a week for 10 weeks. I have made it through 6 evenings, one mid term exam and two assignments.

I am not sure where this will lead, but so far, so good!

Vacation Time

Bob and I,  along and our adult daughters, are going on a trip to Hawaii tomorrow morning! I am soooooo excited. We have been planning this for months and I can hardly believe the trip is finally here. The girls are only staying a few days for our tropical family vacation and then Bob and I will be staying for another week on our own little second honeymoon.

 Our daughter found us a good deal and booked us into a couple of different exciting locations!

I must admit that I have had a lot of anxiety about this trip and a lot of trouble getting organized, but now it is too late for me to do anything different. No more lists. No more shopping, no more planning how to pack or planning where to stay. All I can do is get on that plane.

I went back and forth about just how I was going to manage physically on this trip.  I have not been using the walker for months now, but I also have not been doing as much walking or challenging moving as I was a year ago. I am finding that my new knee brace is a really big help but I don't think it will be enough. The knee brace makes my knee feel a lot better, but when I wear it I find that my ankle gives out much faster for some reason.

My family will do all they can to help me but I still can't imagine how I will carry my luggage, stand in lines and still do all that I want to do and only hang on to my cane.  We decided that I am going to take the walker, and the knee brace, and the ankle brace and yes the cane!

I am ready for adventure!



clip art from http://www.rosiepiter.com/

Adult Trainings

I agreed to do a training this past weekend for Adult Girl Guide Leaders.  That was arranged last summer.  How did the end of October sneak up on me like this?

We had a great weekend at a local camp with indoor facilities. We had a theme for the weekend ---  we were hosting a pretend "cruise" with lots of references to movies like Pirates of the Caribbean and old TV shows like the Love Boat and Gilligan's Island. Around 50 adults took part as we played "Minute to Win It" style games Friday night, trainings on various topics Saturday and Sunday and a Captain's Halloween style dress-up gala dinner on Saturday night. That was followed by a sing along campfire, karaoke and a chance to play Texas Hold'um poker for Girl Guide crests and badges instead of cash. We participated in a great Sunrise Tai chi session, outdoor gourmet cooking and we also had a great service project sewing lap quilts for use by the Alzheimer's society.

My hour and a half long session was called Knot-ical Adventures. At one time I was pretty good at tying knots. It is really not as necessary a camping skill now as it once was with modern tents and equipment, but it is still very useful to know a few knots and rope crafts.  I thought I should try to demonstrate knot skills by using a variety of more adult appropriate crafts and resources and to teach a few fun games that can be used when working with girls. Mainly it had to be entertaining, challenging but not too challenging, and applicable to my participants lives and helpful in their work with girls in their own Guiding Units. Phew!

At first I had hoped to have the assistance of my middle daughter but she wound up volunteering to run a session at the same time as me about issues related to child behavior called Mutiny on the Bounty.
Okay, not to panic, there was another leader who really knows her knots that was willing to help but she had a family emergency a couple days before the event. Oh oh.
My lovely eldest daughter Liz came to the rescue the night before camp and agreed to drive out for my session and give me a hand. I really don't think I could have done it without her help.

I had 16 ladies signed up with varied experience in knot tying so I felt I needed a large variety of crafts and resources to meet their needs.
 I found it incredibly hard to decide how to organize this session. Executive function /cognitive problems reared their ugly head when I was organizing and planning for this thing.   I did over plan and I  had way too many crafts and resources, but it was easier to let some activities go than find myself short of things to fill my time slot. It went well and everyone seemed to have a good time.

I do have some right left confusion, and tying complicated knots was a whole lot harder than ever before so I put in a lot of practice to try to get back up to speed.  I left the majority of the hands on demonstrating to my daughter and to a couple of cool YouTube videos. I acted more like a coach.

This chance to teach a session mattered to me emotionally since I really wanted to be teaching and leading training sessions again; it was part of me trying to reclaim my old life and skills. Liz also helped keep things moving smoothly from activity to activity and she made sure I didn't try to run back and forth too much and loose my balance.

Two years ago I was not able to tie up my shoelaces and everything was Velcro closures. A year ago I could hold on to items with my left hand, but could barely rotate my wrist.  My hand would grab onto something and my hand would spasm closed very tightly. I had to pry my left hand fingers off with my right hand because I could not convince my hand to let go. This year... well ...my hand works. I drop things a lot and I still have trouble with two handed tasks like typing and piano playing, but I get by.

I am pretty sure that most of my workshop participants would be shocked to know what a major challenge this event was for me and how exhausting it was. It has taken me 4 days of resting to get moving again after the excitement of the weekend.

Last week I taught one knot to a few of my Stroke Recovery Association buddies.
I challenge you to give this one a try. It might even prove useful some time.

Testing Week is OVER!

Well, it is over! 

Yesterday was the last day of testing and I did finish off the last two sections of the CAAT test.  One part was a written mechanical aptitude and problem solving test and that did not go well for me.  Pulley? Rods? Which is spinning faster? I called my mechanic husband during the break and whined to him about my lack of skill and he said isn't it good that I have him and I don't actually have to do that kind of thing. Pheww. Perspective is helpful.  

After lunch I tried doing the Science section. I was worried that I would blow it and that would have been devastating to me. I have spent my life as a Science nerd. Happiness is the Discovery Channel. It turns out that it was a snap and I had nothing to worry about. Frustrated little ol' me couldn't stop  from making editorial notes in places where questions were just plain written wrong. Common knowledge is not always the same as correct knowledge.  The guy asked what I meant by my notes in the margin,  and I played science teacher and explained to him exactly what was flawed about several of the questions.  It helped a little bit with my poor damaged self-esteem.

I then did some directed internet research. My tester had me look into jobs that might be of interest  and I went through a big book listing possible careers and I noted ones that I might like. The objective was not to worry too much about how realistic it would be considering my health and abilities, but more to get some direction for discussion and possible careers I could be happy doing.

It kind of surprised me to find that various jobs I did have in the past still came up on my list. It is nice to realize that I don't regret my past choices.

At the end of the day I was given some of the results related to the interest surveys from the first day. Two main profile interest areas came up in one of the tests.  One was "Social" where examples of occupations are family counseling, museum interpreter, community and social services, and recreation consultant would be examples in that category.  "Directive" was the other main category with jobs like dietician, art conservator, flim editor archivist and school principal.

My interests, according to a different test, would include life science (biologist, biochemist, physiologist), social science (criminologist, economist social psychologist), followed by teaching. The surprise add in was technical writer ( scientific writer, handbook writer, legal secretary, service publication writer) but that was without looking at how I scored on the English language tests!

 I really don't yet know right now what good this will do me.  I will be meeting with my vocational counselor in a couple weeks where we will go over the abilities part of the test and look at this interest and aptitude part a little further. Then we will make a plan for my future!

I went home and basically collapsed.  I only woke up to take some Advil and then I went back to sleep for most of the night. I am still not at all recovered.

I didn't go into this thinking the week would be easy, but I sure wasn't prepared for how physically demanding and emotionally challenging it turned out to be. 

Reality is very tough to face.

Clip art licensed from the Clip Art Gallery on DiscoverySchool.com 

 

Vocational Testing Day 4

Today went a little better.

I was allowed a little more time with that math problem solving from yesterday but basically I still took forever and I think I got more questions wrong than right. I was never fantastic at Math but it is unbelievably difficult now.  One thing I did was write in the exam book! Gasp! I still needed to write on the bubble sheet, but at least this way I could double check that I was still on the correct line of the test. I kept doing stupid things like figuring out the answer and then I would find myself looking for the numeral of the question  as if it was one of the multiple choice answers. That would be my short term memory issue rearing it's ugly head.

The tester got me to do a memory test. He had me look at a page with 20 pictures on it for a period of time and then I was supposed to recall what the pictures were. I have had lots of practice with this style of test in OT. This time I think I recalled 14 items and I told him I have worked on this a lot and have found coping techniques. He said that he could tell I was using some techniques. Yup it shows.

Today there was also a hands-on component to the testing. I think the idea is to check fine motor control and hand eye coordination. I do not think I have a future as a welder.  My mechanic husband would have probably split his sides laughing if he could have seem me try to string electrical wires through little holes.
Worse than showing limited aptitude on those skills was that I found it impossible to work on the paper and pencil tasks that I was personally more concerned with while others were taking their turns banging on the test equipment. Even the sound of the instructor talking in the background was enough to throw me off track.

We also had some tasks sorting cards into different orders. I think I was pretty accurate with those tasks, but maybe not as fast as would be needed for a career as a filing clerk.

Another activity was a spelling test.  It was the old fashioned version where the teacher says the word and you write it on a piece of paper. I had an overwhelming urge to get up in the middle and go sharpen my pencil but I resisted.

Then we went on to a language arts test. We had to dentify punctuation, capitalization and grammer errors for one section followed by organizing sentences into the correct order in a paragraph.
Oh oh. You writers and editors out there show great restraint when  reading blogs like mine!

A highlight of the day was lunch with two of the other ladies. We talked about how much difference it made to be having a breakfast with protein before doing all this testing. We talked a bit about our hopes for new jobs. We also talked about how nice it is to have some structure in the day. You spend your working days looking forward to vacation time and retirement, but the reality is that it is good to have somewhere you are expected to be and something worthwhile to do.

Clip art licensed from the Clip Art Gallery on DiscoverySchool.com

Testing and More Testing

Today was day three of the five day job rehabilitation apptitude testing. My vocational therapist/coordinator got me into this testing program sooner because they had a cancellation.

I am not having fun.

It is a nice space, nice staff and only 4 of us are being evaluated. It is like doing a 5 day version of a SAT test with a few interviews mixed in. You get there, sit down and get handed a test booklet.  There are interest tests, basic skills, basic knowledge. There are vocabulary tests, mechanical aptitude tests, spelling tests, basic arithmetic,  harder math and math word problems to solve.
My eyes barely track together  across a page now, but that is nothing compared to what a question booklet and a separate bubble sheet can do to me.

I must say it really sucks to have my shortcomings  made so obvious to me....  and they haven't started showing me the analysis of the results.  

Yesterday there was  a strange little computer test to do. That one had a variety of skills to test with some of them timed. It was kind of part pick the best answer for spelling, synonyms, math and some that were more like a computer game. You move the square box over the shape that is similarly or differently shaped or colored as fast as you can.
Much to my shock I got none right and it set off an alarm that had the girl administering the test come and explain in person that the objective of that part of the test was to match the size of the box in the center with the same size of shape on the outside of the circle. Oh my goodness! I could not get it right! I had a flashback to an early days event when I was on the floor trying to match up a garbage bag of Tupperware containers and Tupperware lids. I wound up sitting there crying and not having a clue what was wrong and why I couldn't match them. (I now use zip seal bags or things with lids attached)

Today the test was something called the "The Canadian Adult Achievement Test"

It is a measure of an adult's current functional level in mathematics, reading and language. This battery of achievement tests has been designed specifically for the Canadian adult, regardless of his or her previous school experience. more here

It should take about 4 and a half hours, not including breaks.  I have huge cognitive math issues now and after 80 minutes of math I was barely functioning,  let alone recalling order of operation for algebraic statements.  My head was pounding, my left eye would no longer focus and I was seeing double. They sent me home at noon telling me that they will give me time to complete the other sections tomorrow but that the disastrous last hour from today is now a write-off.


Two more days to go.

graphic is from http://www.discoveryeducation.com/

I Completed My Occupational Therapy!

 Last week was my very last Occupational Therapy appointment.

I have been with my occupational therapist at the Easy Street Program for just over 2 years now. I have had weekly appointments and I have done a phenomenal amount of homework. I can't begin to tell you all the material we covered and all the information I learned or relearned in this time. I keep saying that I have never really worked or studied so hard before in my whole life. I didn't even know I was capable of working this hard!

I have had a lot of cognitive problems.  At this point I am coping pretty well. My memory, for example, is not the same as it was, but between using memory tricks, taking notes as I go and recording little messages to myself I am really functioning pretty normally. I wish  all my cognitive problems had just gone away or I had "recovered" but the fact is I have recovered a bit and I have learned a lot of adaptive strategies.  I know that I will still keep coming up with different cognitive problems in my life but we have worked on developing the skills and techniques to allow me to solve my own problems in the future.

 We have been picking up the loose ends and making sure I was in a good place to move on with my life. We did a few more cognitive tests to check on my status as well as other evaluations and we worked on those last few worries. I now have some future plans, like job rehabilitation, and possibly even going back to college. I can keep working on developing my current strengths and learning to be the best I can with where I find myself now.


During the last month my therapist had one last project for me. I was to gather up all the occupational therapy notes and handouts from the past two years and get them organized into a resource binder that I can turn to in the future. The second week I came up with a very long list of all the different skills we had worked on, and all the different goals we had identified.  The third week I went through the previous list along with my actual papers and I tried to make categories for the papers. For week four I had my binder organized, but it became obvious that a little more refinement was necessary and I added an extra category and printed out an index page and added labeled dividers between the sections.  My binder has my handwritten notes, it had jokes, and quotes. It has handouts and worksheets and list of questions I had written out to ask my therapist. Yes, it is a resource binder, but it is also a diary that reflects so much about me and my struggles over the past couple of years.

The last page of my binder has photos of my front steps we had to show the therapist why I was having trouble getting in the house. At the beginning of this journey I would sit on my walker crying at the bottom of the stairs because I was unable to get into my own house. That seems so long ago in some ways and like it was just yesterday in others.

I wanted to give my therapist a little gift.
I photographed a little angel statue in the hospital garden.  I thought it would be meaningful to her and that it would reflect some of the issues I had worked on.  I printed it up and put it in a pretty frame. I knew that she would love it and that she will think of me in the future. I hope that she will also remember with pride what we have accomplished together.

Origami Cranes

This crane was a project from my occupational therapist in December 2009. It was just before Christmas and my therapist thought this would be a nice change. She handed me my choice of some origami paper and an illustrated page with directions for how to make a crane. This was incredibly hard to do at that time. I have made hundreds and hundreds of these cranes in the past both with my own kids and with my Girl Guide Groups, but do you think I could do it easily even with directions?     Nope. 

The points of this exercise will have been decision making to start with  by picking the paper, following ordered directions, and some fine motors skills for my hand. I got really good at doing a lot of things one handed but paper folding wasn't one of them at that point; I actually needed to use that second hand a bit to make sharp folds.  I persevered and managed to produce this little guy and I took him home and we hung him on our tree.
 This little crane represents so much to me. It stands for peace and it is a reminder  of a positive changing point in my recovery.

Photographer Madeline Bea is joining in a movement to show signs of hope and prayers for the people of Japan.

I am joining her and linking up with her weekly creative challenge this week "The Sunday Creative"


Madeline choose this topic in support of the people of Japan. She wrote:

You can submit your images to the 1000 Cranes for Japan Flickr group. Also, I’ve decided to make this week’s Sunday Creative prompt Crane as well to try and get even more participation, even more cranes, even more hope, and even more prayers.  The Miya Company is offering to donate $5 for each of the first 1000 crane images they receive to the Save the Children for Japan’s relief and recovery.

The Miya Company page is a nice informative page with a good goal. It includes a PDF with directions to make a crane. Check it out.

Valentine's Tea and Baking Cookies

Yesterday was the annual "Valentines Tea" at my local Stroke Recovery Association. I was so excited about it. I was into making goodies for the bake sale, I donated materials for the silent auction, I took a turn selling tickets for an upcoming ticket draw for some really nice jewelery. I worked hard on convincing my stroke affected friends and their families that they should come. The tea was a great success and we had a lot of fun. The weather was mild, at least for here, and we had a really good turnout.

The thing that mattered the most to me was the fact that the girls from the Girl Guides of Canada groups I am associated came to help serve tea and the sandwiches and dainties. We had 2 young adults and 7 girls between the ages of 12 and 16 volunteered to help and they were absolutely awesome! I was so very proud of them.

It was kind of strange to combine the two charities that I am involved with but the girls felt great about helping and the people attending the tea commented over and over what wonderful hard working girls were serving the tea.

The treats I made were a success too. Baking is one of the things I have struggled with and I really have had to work hard on getting my skills back. Baking involves measuring and using numbers, it involves remembering what you have already added and it requires remembering that you put it in the oven and not letting it burn to a smokey crisp.

I have made "peanut blossom" cookie several times and I am starting to get a routine worked out at least for this kind of cookie.

I saw the link for these cookies with a heart shaped chocolate instead of a Hershey Kiss and I though that was perfect for a Valentine's Day tea. I will confess the first batch was left in the oven long enough that they weren't fit to use, but the second day I got more chocolates, tried again and didn't leave the kitchen for the 10 minutes they need to bake.

The cookie recipe and the picture above is from eighteen25.blogspot.com.
I love their blog-- it makes me feel like cooking and crafting.

Video- My name is Lisa

The stress on the family is tremendous when a member is affected by cognitive impairment.
This is a very moving video.

Here is a link to the Canadian Alzheimer's Organization. This is a very good site with lots of useful info on Brain Awareness and Healthy Brain advice that is a little more generic and reaches beyond Alzheimer issues.

Decision Making Yet Again

This business of making decisions is hard!

It is difficult to even accept that I have a problem with something so basic to living a productive life. This makes it hard to work on the topic. I always feel pretty normal right until something goes wrong and then it smacks me right between the eyes that I am not functioning like I used to.

We solve problems and make decisions everyday and do it all day long. We make decisions about home and about recreation and about shopping at stores. What shall we have for dinner? How to pick the correct groceries. How to hire roofers to do work on your house. There are medical decisions, job decisions, and even decisions about your love life!


I think one little paragraph I read might just make a big difference to me. According to the Brain Injury Resource site:

Avoid making decisions when you are tired, hungry, or under stress or pressure of any sort. On such occasions, your ability to make sound decisions might be compromised by such overlaying factors. It is better to take more time to arrive at a decision than to live with the consequences of an ill-advised one. Set a realistic time line for your response and stick to it; or if necessary, renegotiate it. Bottom line, do not allow yourself to be rushed into a decision that you are not prepared to make. Then as usual, before you make your decision, collect and refine essential information concerning the decision or options before you act.

I think this is all about how I am going to have to learn to adjust my life. Things are not the same and I should not expect life to be the same. Spontaneous is really hard to do now. Planning is necessary.

The first decision should be to be prepared before you start making other choices.
When or where is it is an optimal situation to make the decision?
I need to plan to be rested.
I need to plan to give myself enough time and not be rushed.
I need to plan ahead.
I need to minimize how much I am doing and how much I am deciding at one time.
I need to take baby steps and don't try to solve all problems in one single swoop.


At Occupational Therapy we tried working with the chart on this page that I found and felt was clear to me. We worked on practicing a scenario using this page. It was not bad for a first try but not great either. Yes, here we go again, practice practice practice!

I found this page a bit clearer, I think because it is kind of pictorial and that seems to be my best learning technique now. I seem to work with my visual memory best, especially pictures and shapes. Now I have to make this chart into my own version and memorize it!


Here are some of the links I found that were helpful.

Brain Injury Resource Center Decision Making Skills

The Open University Making Decisions

Study Guides and Stategies Problem Solving and Decision Making (This is very useful. I am making this my new on-line workbook for many other issues as well as decision making)

How to make Decisions: Coherence, Emotions, and Practical Inference (Kind of a philosophy approach.)

Basic Guidelines to Problem Solving and Decision Making

Mind Tools Introduction to Decision Making Techniques



Bonus Link
This is not really on topic but I found it rather enlightening and I am considering buying Dr Wang's book. Look at this video. The guy is a very good speaker.

Welcome to your Brain by Sam Wang.
The Video is a TEDxSF speech on the topic of "Neuroscience and Willpower".

Decisions, Decisions!

I have been working really hard on learning about decision making and problem solving. Basically I went overboard with the internet research and got overwhelmed again.

I saw my therapist again today and I tried to summarize what I learned and explain the steps in problem solving. I tried to explain a few helpful tools and techniques for making decisions. It did not go well! I had trouble remembering very much that was specific or actually remembering anything that would be helpful.

For next time I am supposed to stick with the KISS technique and "keep it simple". The goal is to come up a list of simple and memorable steps to follow when faced with making decisions. She explained that right now my decision making is not automatic like it once was. If I make a plan and I am consistent in following it, decision making will become easier and less stressful, it should become more automatic and decision making will become faster.

I will share a few of the informative links I found on this topic once I can decide which are worth sharing!


In the meantime this cheered me up.

Problems with decision making?

I now have problems with some basic things like short term memory, paying attention, and sequencing. I have gotten a lot of help with these issues through Occupational Therapy but I still have a long way to go.

The current issue we are working on is my problems with decision making. In the past I would have been called decisive. I tended to be logical and fast and confident in my opinions. I tended to be a leader in many situations. My friends, after my illness, have commented about my indecision and a few actually said they were concerned because I wasn't being as "bossy" as usual. I could have taken that as a criticism of the old Linda, but I knew they meant it with love and thought of bossy as a good thing.

The hard decisions aren't so bad. If there are really clear pros or cons I am fine. If I have had preferences from the past that I remember, it is okay. Maybe there is a little lag time, but I do make decisions.

It has been the little things that really aren't important that get me hung up. What kind of tea do you want? Which direction do you want to turn on a neighborhood walk? Those now seem to be the difficult choices.

I recently told my occupational therapist, rather casually, that I had a crying meltdown in Wal-mart recently over choosing candles for Thanksgiving. Which scent to choose, which size, how many for how much money? Now, I really did not care that much one way or another, but I sure got upset when I found myself standing there, frozen like a deer in car headlights, crippled with indecision. I started crying and told my husband to forget it and that I want to go home! Bob just picked up 2 candles for $8. End of topic. He steered me to another department and tried to distract me. My therapist, T, thought we should address this as it is just plain not functional to spend my time crying and not making decisions.

She told me to come up with a phrase to repeat to myself every time I find myself freezing in order to diffuse the situation. It is "no big deal" ,"this is not a big problem"? Picking a phrase is just another version of the original problem. I went back and forth and back and forth on my phrase choices. Eventually, once cornered by T, I went with:

"It is just not the end of the world Linda!!"

OT homework for this week is to do research on the internet about decision making strategies. There is a lot out there on the topic so I will be kept busy this weekend. Doing internet research is very comfortable for me so I should learn a lot.