Friday update on Mike (8/17)

Mike's progress is excellent at this point. Today, I could barely notice slurs in his speech and he's talking in complete sentences. At times, it takes him a couple of seconds to process and begin talking, but he really is doing great. He walked a few stairs today and brushed his teeth. He actually said brushing his teeth was more difficult than walking the stairs! I guess there's a lot more coordination required to brush your teeth than we realize.
He's getting a little stir-crazy in the hospital, so I take that as a good sign too. We hooked up the iPod and watched a slideshow of pictures of him playing basketball and wakeboarding, two of his favorite things to do. We also watched a lot of family pictures when Nicholas was born and watched he and Anthony grow up on the TV screen, Mike really seemed to enjoy that. At one point he was eating some candies that we forced him to eat with his right hand to help build strength. He began throwing them to mom across the room trying to make it in her mouth, that was pretty funny.

As far as his heart goes, we did get to talk to the cardiologist today. She told us that Baylor in Dallas would most likely be doing the heart surgery. At this point, they are unclear on whether it will be open-heart or the cath procedure that enters an artery through the leg and up to the heart. Mike is really anxious about open-heart surgery, so pray for strength both physically and mentally for him. The cardiologist is going to have to go back and read the report and watch the video of some of those tests to see what size the hole in his heart is. If it's 1.5cm or smaller, then he'll get the cath procedure, if it's larger, it will have to be open heart.

It will most likely be early next week before we are able to confirm the surgery appointment. They plan on keeping Mike in the hospital until then. If anyone would like to write him a message, just post a comment and I'll bring it to him later today or tomorrow. Let me know if you have any questions, I post these updates quickly...and I have no idea what I'm talking about half the time! Just want to make sure I've been clear.