Originally Posted by
Machka
During Rowan's recovery, his physiotherapists generally seem to work on specific tasks to increase his range of motion in his right arm, for example, and others.
Meanwhile, with or without their knowledge, I've been encouraging a more general approach from getting him up and walking back in the hospital, to the gardening, and of course cycling.
He is still within 1 year of his accident, but is probably fitter than a lot of people I see around. And the neurosurgeon he saw for his back just about fell off his chair when Rowan told him that the longest ride he had been on to that point was 27 km (he did 40 km yesterday, so we're still progressing!). The neurosurgeon said that it was extremely unusual for someone to cycle at all, let alone 27 km within the first year of a brain injury of the severity of Rowan's. But I wonder if maybe most people don't have someone encouraging them to do that ... and don't have the background and motivation to do that.
Anyway, we're probably both not as fit as we were, but we do have a reasonable sort of fitness which we can build on.
That's good news about Rowan
Part of it is the mystery of TBI's; like strokes their recovery is highly individualized. Part of it could be your encouragement and because of his passion, an intrinsic motivation/work ethic to regain cycling. What part the Physio works on also depends. There are several theories on TBI recovery. Sometimes if they worry about it, they will focus on gross movement first, but if they expect that to return they may leapfrog to fine motor skills so the person doesn't lose too much in the interim. Some theory advocates making progress by encouraging incorrect compensatory movement while other theory rejects compensatory movement in favour of more correct movement, even if it takes longer. It's all very interesting stuff to study because the jury is still out on a lot of it. If he is making good progress then whatever is creating it is good stuff - if it works don't fix it!
Having read some of your exploits I also suspect there was more than
reasonable fitness to build upon
