The only thing on our schedule was meeting with my friend for a speech therapy session. Then Archie added a few activities. We got up around 7 am and Archie decided he wanted a Subway breakfast sandwich so I went to get breakfast. We then went for a walk at 10 am which was a lap on our street. Then Archie wanted to meet his partner in business, Matt and Chris for lunch. I was interested to see how eating at a restaurant would be since Archie is so sensitive to sounds and restaurants can be pretty loud. Archie said it really was not too horrible, just that the table next to us was noisy with loud laughing and talking. Afterwards, we went to visit our friends'/clients' new house for Archie to work on programming challenge. We also got to see their beautiful house! We then had some time to kill so I suggested going to Dick's Sporting Goods to get a couple more pairs of UnderArmor pants and a new jacket. Afterwards, we walked the NorthEast Mall which was another milestone because I was worried about the noise level and the distance. We walked most of the mall and Archie did very well. We tried to get me a new iPhone but they were sold out at Best Buy and the AT&T kiosk at the mall so we will visit the Apple store eventually.
We then hung out and killed time before we headed to Andrea's house for the speech therapy evaluation. We even did a short walk down Andrea's street while we were waiting (3 houses and back). We got to Andrea's and she got her beautiful baby fed and to bed. Then Archie and Andrea sat down for the evaluation. At the end Andrea said that Archie has a mild case and the areas of concern were short term memory, easily distracted and eye concentration. Archie did a good job listening to Andrea. She explained all of her concerns and explained different indicators throughout the evaluation that helped her make her conclusions. After the discussion I think Archie realizes that there are some cognitive challenges and that there will need to be some changes in his thinking processes. For a little while I am going to have to double check some of his activities that are involved with short term tasks. We are going to get a clock, a calendar and a white board at the store tomorrow and Archie will take control of our schedule daily to help with keeping track of time and help with memory challenges. My job will be to assist him with remembering tasks without telling him what is on the schedule, for example if we are suppose to go for a walk at 10 am - I will ask him what time it is to prompt him to think about the schedule versus asking him when we are going on a walk. Andrea will also be sending us different exercises to do throughout the the week for Archie to do, she will either email both of us or text us the tasks. She also gave us a game called Set that she wants us to play everyday for 30 minutes which is a memory game. She said that due to is eye concentration she does not suggest Archie drive immediately even if the seizure doctor says that he did not have a seizure. Also, that he slowly goes back to work for example maybe work on a small programming challenge one day and then the next day work a little longer. Originally, I was thinking that after Thanksgiving we could both start going back to work part time. But that might be a little more than he can handle. I am going to wait for the results of all the doctors' appointments before I make any plans at this point.
Overall it was a BIG day for Archie. We left the house at lunchtime and got home at 7:30 pm so we did a bunch of walking and sitting up. He did an amazing job and I was blown away by how well he did, he kept suggesting activities and I could not believe it- lunch out, going to the job and walking the mall. What an ambitious day Archie had!
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