January 8 Update

Hello or should I say cześć which is pronounced chesh-ch. It is so strange to be in a place where so many people speak another language. I must say that many of them know far more English than the few words I know in Polish. It is very interesting to go out shopping and try to explain things to the clerk. Davin doesn't seem to mind them talking to him in Polish. The therapists speak mostly in Polish, but they do know quite a bit of English, too.

We have finished day four of our 8-day stretch of therapy. We did not get to have Sunday off this week, so by Saturday I think there will be many exhausted children in this place. Davin has been working hard in therapy. Last night he was up quite a bit of the night with his muscles hurting, but still managed to give alot during his gym time. Today he worked on crawling, pushing with his arms, and walking on his knees with a walker. All of these activities are done with much assistance from the three therapists that work with him for the two hours in gym. They make sure that every movement is done correctly and are trying to train his body to do things the right way. Sometimes I feel discouraged after gym when I think he hasn't worked as hard as he should, but then at night, he has shown us that he is learning some of the new things. The suit that he wears for those two hours puts a tremendous amount of resistance on his muscles and when he takes it off, things seem much easier. The parents are encouraged to try the suit on so that we will know what our kids are dealing with. Alan and I have not done that yet, but we will before we leave.

Alan is still doing work while he is over here with us. He continues to have meetings over the phone with many people and we try to stay quiet while these are going on. As I type this letter, he is on one with Davin crying in the background. Oh dear, maybe we're not always quiet. We try to be very careful to get Davin to bed at a decent time since morning comes so quickly and the work begins so soon after that.

We are so thankful for everyone's love and prayers while we are here. We would ask that you continue to pray for Davin that he would receive God's full blessing for him while he is here. Pray especially for Davin's motivation. We have been talking to him about why he wants to learn these things. I don't think Davin is terribly disappointed with his life as it is, and I want him to realize that there is much more for him if he can do things on his own. I try to tell him that he will be able to do things like Cheney and hope that thought will motivate him further. Also pray for endurance. The mornings are long and the therapy is tough. Our head therapist Kasha tells Davin that it is not play time, this is work time. One other thing to pray for is Davin's sleep schedule. If he doesn't have enough rest, it is difficult for him to complete all of his therapy as well as he could. Please pray that he would go to sleep when his body tells him that he needs to. We are hoping to start swimming with him in the evenings tomorrow and that should help with this need. We also started taking Davin in the Jacuzzi today to help with the muscle soreness. We had purchased lotion for sore muscles and shipped it over here prior to us coming, but the package never arrived, so we are trying the Jacuzzi. His therapist seems to think that will be good for him.