May 7, 2013 – Tuesday morning. I’m in Anthony’s room. It’s about 8:45. Earlier we were laughing and communicating with our eyes, smiles and the “thumbs up” that is now an Anthony trademark.

I asked Anthony what things are most challenging to him. He pointed to his mouth and then to his left side. Just as we were communicating about his speech, his speech therapist walked in. Kim is very good at what she does. Each patient is assigned a team. Just the other day, Kim and I were discussing what an awesome team Anthony has.

Kim, pictured here, came in to see about Anthony because she had speech with him at 9 a.m. So since we were just talking about speech, I asked some questions. We learned how much eating and swallowing are associated with speaking. I asked Kim if there was anything she had seen that indicated Anthony would not be able to speak. She said no. I love for Anthony to hear things like that. I know her words must ring in his ears as he struggles to get through his challenges with speaking.

We had a really informative meeting, then Anthony and I rolled into the gym.

Each ward has its own gym where each team works with their patients. Kim had brought some pretzel sticks for Anthony’s speech therapy session. Anthony needs to learn how to chew, and apparently pretzel sticks are good for this. They are just hard enough that you have to press down to break off a piece, but they become soft enough to swallow when they are inside your mouth for a while. It was very interesting seeing how Kim interacted with Anthony. This photo is of Anthony and Kim during that session.

As we were doing this, Kim Young walked up. She had just finished a phone meeting with her department at MUSC, so we all had a chance to be part of Anthony’s speech therapy. Kim, the speech therapist, asked Anthony if he wanted something else besides pretzels. He asked for his alphabet board and started pointing to letters that seemed to spell liquor. I asked him why he wanted liquor, but, in fact, he was spelling out licorice. Later in the day, when Anthony was taking a nap, Kim and I went grocery shopping and bought some licorice for Anthony. He continued his speech therapy Wednesday with licorice.

Life is an attitude, and Anthony is living his life to its fullest. Thank you everyone who cares enough about Anthony to take the time to read this. You are one of the reasons Anthony has a great attitude.