Progress

When I first came to this house, I was only speaking single words and short phrases. I commonly lost my voice and then I couldn't talk at all.

Time went on. I've said I was slowly progressing. This couldn't immediately be seen. It would take months and by then it would be a different professional, if I even had one at the time. My voice kept getting better. If you compared this to when I had no voice, then there is major improvement.

 

 

Recently, I was asked about progress since the time of that first video. My slow progression hadn't stopped, and you can see that yourself.

 

 

You can hear the talking is much more smooth. I didn't have to practice what I would say. This was originally an update for a friend. I had no intention of making it public. Later I've seen the importance of doing so.

I move my other hand now. That wasn't supposed to happen. I don't get Occupational Therapy (OT) anymore and it's good that I knew a little bit. Now I do that. That and speech have been my strongest areas. I do both.

Improvement hasn't immediately been seen in my case. Now that I think about it, the case is similar to that of Terry Wallis. 

"The nerve fibers from the cells were severed, but the cells themselves remained intact." Nerve cells that have not died can form new connections. It goes on to say, "The new research suggests that instead of the sudden recovery Wallis seemed to make when he began speaking and moving three years ago, he actually may have been slowly recovering all along, as nerves in his brain formed new connections at a glacial pace until enough were present to make a network." http://braininjuryknow.blogspot.com/2013/04/getting-there.html

My nerve fibers weren't "severed" but saturated with blood. Saturation is associated with death. These nerve fibers died. My cells, though, remained in tact. It sounds really close. (Scientists will say my cells were also saturated. For this there was DNA replication, http://thoughtfulveg.blogspot.com/2013/08/an-exact-copy.html If a virus from 1918 can be brought back, http://www.nature.com/nm/journal/v11/n11/pdf/nm1105-1154.pdf?origin=publication_detail so can a brain cell be brought back. )

Wallis took a long time before improvement was seen. All that was happening in him was not seen. Improvement was happening all along. This is why case management is needed. Case management would have ordered screenings and tests that would have picked up on biological changes, the things that can't be seen with the naked eye.

I've most likely have had small biological changes all along. It wasn't 'Boom! She's all better.' My progress has been so slow, yet my cognitive skills are so high, it will, and already does, look comical to leave me at the lower level. That error is in the set-up. It has happened before and will most likely happen again since correction isn't taken. (The difference here is the patient has phenomenal cognitive skills and can point out the error.)

 

Progress Doesn't Count Here

"You are a fraud. Prove you were in a vegetative state. No one in that kind of mental state of being can use a computer much less form coherent thought. You are nothing but a troll preying on the lesser intelligencia who gullibly believes in your crap." - comment from BerryM on http://thoughtfulveg.blogspot.com/2013/06/why-i-shook-my-head.html

I'm not a fraud. The government made a mistake. It's a pretty big one, too. To mistakenly label someone as unconscious is big. According to this statement above, the government does not make mistakes. The government was right all those years ago, I am a "vegetable."

So it asks for proof... http://thoughtfulveg.blogspot.com/2014/10/the-medical-records-of-horror-story.html quotes the most from medical records. I'm not a corpse anymore, either. Why doesn't that get any comments?

This is where I was. (I'd still be there if it didn't close. Could what I am experiencing be due to a failing economy? That would be awesome!) You can't tell me no mistake was made. A music therapist says, "I first played guitar for her when she was in the Sub-Acute area of El Camino Hospital. A nurse one day begged me to come and play for the people there that had no hope. They were what are referred to as "vegetables" and when I first saw them pushed into the room I was getting ready to play (in beds and wheelchairs)….I wondered will these people even be able to hear music…" http://thoughtfulveg.blogspot.com/2012/02/angela.html

I was labeled not conscious because I didn't move. Now that I move you think it would be changed. No, it won't. The government has gone so far as to send me an e-mail explaining to me that I am in a coma, http://thoughtfulveg.blogspot.com/2014/05/dear-vegetable.html

Progress doesn't count. You are stuck with what you are given and that's it.

So back to that comment, "...No one in that kind of mental state of being can use a computer much less form coherent thought..." I agree. That state can't. Why am I still classified in this state? Is it because my speech isn't understood? I've worked hard on that so it can be. That means it goes back to http://neurosciencenews.com/neuroimaging-consciousness-vegetative-state-1444/ Scientists Find ‘Hidden Brain Signatures’ of Consciousness in Vegetative State Patients  Oh no! I'm not understood. Now it's something different.

I've learned your way, but I'm still classified "vegetative." Whoa. That's oppression.

 Someone who is asleep will not say no. Neither will someone who is unconscious.

If anyone is "gullible" and feels like I am "preying on [your] lesser intelligencia," please don't read this. It is just a blog, and is full of my opinions. Go read the tabloids or a science fiction novel. I'm not twisting your arm.

Don't Get Your Hopes Up

Are you just fooling yourself? "Once confirmed, Angela Ronson, 'progress,' defined as the patient's conditions changes and she's willing to have it studied, would appear to be a valued & positive status upgrade."- Robert Demichelis II. The "progress" I've had has been going on for a long time. What would all of a sudden happen to change that to the progress is now recognized?

Some are excited over the fact I'm exhibiting movement on my paralyzed side. http://thoughtfulveg.blogspot.com/2014/08/my-parralyzed-hand.html  This progress isn't something new. You are reading this typed with my other "paralyzed" hand. I didn't go to a therapy to get this hand working. I did this myself...mostly using marbles and containers. The marbles came from a recreation cabinet when I was in long-term care at a "real" hospital. No formal therapy. This is what I did years ago with special needs preschoolers.

Progress goes further than that. The big one I noticed was sound. I started making sounds like 7 months after waking from a coma. This is the deep sleep I was in. The government says I'm currently in a coma. I don't think so. I opened my eyes. I just couldn't move and that's what they call coma. I'm too slow to make deadlines, so the original diagnosis stuck. Now I talk. It's funny since I still have that original diagnosis. 

No therapy on that one. That's big. Progress can be heard. The government still has me in a coma, though.

I don't see this new movement I have making any changes. It should...but I don't see it. The government can be very slow. Don't get your hopes up that "this" will be the change. Change will happen on its own time. In the mean time, I will embarrass some people.

Some may think, "OMG! The real deal...savant syndrome." I refer you to the experts. Making diagnoses has never been my thing (and I've been in the position.) I'm not starting with myself.

Working My Way Back To You

Do you remember this?

 

That's a bit like what I've done. There isn't any technology, though. I'm all natural me. I have used technology. I've used it to communicate. Like right now to type this I've used one hand, yet I've done things requiring two (like capitals).

It has probably taken me so long because it is natural. It has meant doing the same thing everyday for the last few years. A special education teacher who has had  the same student for 5 yrs would know what I mean. Ask any PT (or an OT, or a special ed teacher) you will make progress, although it may be slow.

That's what I am doing with my motor skills. I am slowly making progress. But my cognitive skills are a different story. Cognitively I'm okay.You're supposed to be messed up after a brain bleed like mine. I'm not, and in some ways "better than before (like the video says). That would have to do with re-wiring, which takes more time than allowed by current insurance for rehab.

Now, I'm just working my way back.



Early On



Last Hospital

Now At Home

Before



You can see I'm getting back (You can actually see it in photos!).