Saturday, Sunday and Monday - February 17th through 19th

Hello there,

Tori is still somewhat struggling to adjust to the new time zone... We thought the long weekend would help end it but she decided to stay awake all Friday night again. So we've been giving her medications and ambien during the past few days to try and help her sleep more at night. I think it has been working as Sunday night she was only up at 1:00am for ten minutes and went back to bed for the remainder of the night. Maria and I are fully back time wise but still catching up on some home and work items of course.

Tori continues to have visitors and it seems all of them comment on her improved awareness and color but I'm not sure it can't be contributed to not seeing in a while either. She also loves having all of her TV channels back again!! :-) I'm sure Tori has all those movies we watched over and over again in China memorized like Maria and I do... I've been doing my best on PT (Physical Therapy) duties with Tori but I cannot bend and stretch her the way James did. My techniques aren't nearly as good and I really don't like her crying and yelling at me while doing it... Our insurance company is supposed to pay for additional PT services since it is a new year so hopefully we'll have one assigned this week and get started fully again. Megan and Meredyth should start up home schooling activities and ST (Speech Therapy) again as well. I'm still searching for an acupuncturist and I might just buy Tori her own EMT (Electronic Muscle Treatment) or EMS (Electronic Muscle Stimulator) and learn how to use it.

Tori spent more time in her wheelchair this weekend sans arm rest pillows and was comfortable the majority of the time. We're still trying to feed her more as well. Another newspaper article about Tori's return from China appeared in the Daily Herald Sunday edition. It notes again some of the improvements in Tori which we are observing. The last sentence indicates we still haven't seen that smile which is true but Saturday morning when I was watching her sleep I saw a huge one. It was very unmistakably a smile and she must have been having a great dream of past days in her life I'm sure. Since she was sleeping I'm counting it as a smile but it proves again that her facial muscles CAN produce a beautiful smile. Now just show us one when you are awake Tori!!! :-)

There has been fantastic news on the stem cell front these days!! First off, way to Go Arnold and the state of California who awarded $45 million to twenty research institutions last week with a grand plan to award $3 billion over the next ten years. Cocoa is also good for the brain and there are more great discoveries on how the brain repairs itself. So research advancements are always happening and hopefully their will be human applications in the very near future.

Thanks once more for all of your support and I'll update more frequently this week since we should have more activities for Tori :-)

-Tim