November 22, 2005 - Mid-Morning

Joyful news! After her CAT scan yesterday, our princess was tired all day and we didn't get to see her open her pretty eyes for the remainder of the day, but she more than made up for it with today's progress. Her physical therapist, Mike happened to visit during the 9 - 10 visit this morning and since she had her eyes open (for the first time for Ron), her PT decided to try sitting her up. Mandy eyed both Mike and his assistant up as they pulled down the bed rails and began moving her monkey and princess pillow to the side. We all then watched in amazement as Mike (her PT) and his PT student turned her sideways in her bed and sat her up. They supported her back slightly, but she held her head up all on her own for several minutes. Even Mike was impressed with how well she did sitting up for the first time in 30 days. When she caught Brenda's eye, Brenda told her, "Don't worry, you can't talk yet" and Mandy responded by shaking her head no. When they layed her back in her bed, we all gave her a big, happy round of applause before she fell right back asleep. The best news is that now that she's sat up once, they'll continue working on sitting up and helping her get stronger and stronger.

On the medical side of things, she's now gone more than 48 hours breathing on her own. She is scheduled to have the shunt put in on Friday. We're not sure how long the recovery period is, but we believe that it will be (relatively) short. We hope that we'll be looking at bringing her home not much longer after that! Oh joyful day!