Jonathan Cooper Update

Well, we have had a busy week here since I last wrote and there is so much to share with you. On Thursday last week, the day after Jonathan’s birthday, we spent a few hours at Hawaiian Falls in The Colony with some of our family. It was our first time to go there, it was opening day, and most of the schools were getting out at noon. So we took advantage of the opportunity and went before the crowds got there. It is not a big water park, but there was certainly enough to do to keep us busy for a couple of hours. Aunt Keby was there as well as Uncle Lonnie and Cousin Emily. We had a great time. Jonathan amazed us yet again by going on almost all of the big rides, more than once, and enjoying every minute. I can’t tell you what an amazing change that is for all of us to see in him. We only got to stay for a couple of hours because we had to get home and get the camper loaded for our much anticipated camping trip over the weekend. It had been so long since we had camped that we were very anxious to go. We had a great weekend! We rested, had time to relax, read, played games, visited with friends, swam in the lake, took walks, and even ended a couple of days watching a movie together. (It may not be traditional camping, but it’s our kind of camping!) Jonathan took his scooter and rode it a couple of times on some trails we found. He did very well on it and balanced very nicely. One of the trails was very long and ended at a place where we didn’t know where to go from there, so we ended up walking the entire way back, which was an extremely long walk for Jonathan. But he was a trooper and made it the whole way. We went swimming in the lake every day and had a great time. One evening, Jonathan got to play bocce with all of the men. It was fun to watch him play and he did pretty well keeping up with all the old guys. Amazing as this is, Jonathan actually slept very well the entire trip. We slept a little differently this time. He slept in between his Daddy and I on one of the beds and the girls slept on the other bed. It was actually very comfortable and Jonathan slept better than he had in a while. Needless to say, we were not ready for the weekend to be over, but we had to pack up and come home on Monday. After unpacking on Monday afternoon, we went and had dinner with Grandpa and Grandma Cooper. On Tuesday, Jonathan went to cranial therapy. Mrs. Lori continues to work with Jonathan each week and we are so thankful for all that she is doing with him. She worked some more on his walking. She said he has a lot more tone in his right foot, and he has very little pelvic movement. She had him sit up straight and then slouch. Each time he would do it with his upper body instead of his hips/pelvis. Not having that fluid pelvic movement inhibits his walking. She gave us an exercise that we can work on with him to try to work on that specifically. Tuesday brought with it a little sadness for us. When we returned home from camping, we had an email telling us that the decision had been made, because of the high temperatures, to end the spring session of horse therapy that weekend. We were all ready to go, and take some more family with us to watch. Jonathan was very disappointed. He told me that even though he had only ridden Daisy a couple of week, he already missed her. I talked to Mrs. Tammy and she said we could visit any time we wanted and bring carrots for the horses. I also asked her if it was possible to have her again in the fall because we wanted to stay with her as our therapist. She said the schedule would probably stay the same in the fall, so we will hopefully get to have her again. We love Mrs. Tammy. She was such a joy to have as a therapist. She was always happy to see us, she let the girls help in any way they wanted, and she always sent us away with more knowledge and information about horses than we came with. We are sad not to be going to ride horses each week, but we will go visit as much as we can during the summer so that Daisy and Skip don’t forget us. We had a nice little treat on Tuesday evening. Grandma Cooper, Elizabeth, Sarah and I got to go see Little Women at the Dallas Summer Musicals at Fair Park. The Hollingsworth’s were gracious to give us the tickets that they couldn’t use and we were excited to go as this was one of the musicals we really wanted to see. So while the Cooper girls were at the musical, the Cooper boys were visiting Cabellas for the evening. We all enjoyed our evening. On Wednesday, we tried to start working on our summer schedule of cleaning and organizing the rooms in our house. We really have to take advantage of the summer months to get things done around the house because there is literally no extra time for that during the school year. The kids worked with me on Wednesday, Thursday and Friday to help get started with that. We didn’t spend all our time working, though. Lamar got to work from home all week long, so it was nice to have him around. On Thursday, he had to go to a client site that was 5 minutes away from Grandpa and Grandma Smith. So we went with him and spent the rest of the day with them at their house. Going to their house is our time to just hang out and do nothing, so we spent the afternoon watching a couple of old movies before going to dinner with Uncle Timmy and watching the Mavericks win their playoff game that evening. On Friday we went swimming in the afternoon, shopping in the evening and then watched a movie before going to bed. After sleeping so well on the camping trip Jonathan slept horrible Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday nights. Thursday night he slept really well and last night he slept okay. Last night was the first night that he actually stayed awake during the entire movie that we watched. He always falls asleep sometime during the movie, but not last night. It’s always exciting for him to do something different and it makes us give thanks for even the smallest of changes.
Jonathan is doing so well. We are so thankful that God has given him back to us. This is our second week to be working on our new healthy eating plan. We are trying to stick with it as much as possible. This takes so much preparation and organization on my part. I am trying not to freak out about it and if we get off, we just pick it back up at the next meal and keep going. This has been difficult for me to just get started, but I know that the Lord is helping me because I haven’t given up yet. Please pray that I will take the time to be prepared and organized as much as I can to make this successful. I know that it will get easier the longer we go, but that seems a long way off to me. Pray for me as I try to lead Jonathan each day in this process. He looks to me for direction about what to do next. Pray that I will keep my focus on seeking the Lord and help Jonathan to do that as well because He has promised to add all these things to us if we will do that. I want to tell you what a blessing Jonathan has been to me throughout this process. He has the most wonderful attitude of any 10 year old child that I know. He never complains about what he is eating. Everyone else around him might be eating things that he would otherwise normally eat and yet he patiently waits for me to give him his food, he eats it and is perfectly content with it. He has truly blessed me. I am trying to increase his water intake each day. Jonathan really doesn’t like water and it has been a little difficult to get him to drink much water. I have been praying that God would give him a desire for water and do you know that he never says a thing now when I give him his 8 ounce bottle of water to drink. He just drinks it and gives it back to me empty. We have so much to praise the Lord about! I am asking some people to be specific accountability/prayer partners in this endeavor, but in reality, all of you are our partners in this. I will continue to share Jonathan’s progress with you and I know that you will be faithful to pray for us as you have through this entire journey.
Please continue to pray for Jonathan. Pray for his complete healing of his brain, vision and diabetes. Overall, Jonathan’s blood sugars have been very good and we are very thankful for that. Pray that we will remain disciplined and diligent in this challenge to eat healthy. Pray that God will bless us by allowing us to lose the weight we desire and that He will do exceedingly abundantly above all that we can even imagine, not just for Jonathan, but for our entire family. Pray that we will be able to get on a good exercise schedule as well. Pray that Jonathan will gain better movement in his pelvis and decreased tone in his right leg to help his walking improve. Also pray for his stomach muscles to grow stronger. Pray that his brain will remember the correct way to walk as we work on these areas. We love each one of you and we are so thankful for your love, care and prayers for us. You encourage us so much and we praise God for you. May the Lord bless you and keep you this week.

Philippians 4:13 - I can do all things through Him who strengthens me .