SLP, Andi Curl (left) with Denise Halikman (right)
"Denise learns by repetition," says Andi. "I would love to be there with her 15 or 20 hours a week until a phrase becomes automatic. With the Lingraphica she has the next best thing... a language model that she can practice over and over. That repetition is the key to her learning functional phrases."
years and 20 speech pathologists later, after repeated failures at finding a solution for the
aphasia that resulted from her stroke, Denise Halikman, the author of these sentences,
ended up in the care of SLP, Andi Curl, a woman who—like Denise herself—doesn't take
"no" for an answer. Together these two determined women took on the challenge of finding a
way for Denise to express herself.
Denise's stroke had left her with no spontaneous word retrieval. Almost immediately after beginning treatment, Andi recognized that if given a language model to follow, Denise could, in fact, use words—what she couldn't do was initiate. Andi rightly guessed that the Lingraphica would provide the needed model.
Now Denise is off and running, putting together whole sentences, shopping lists, and even her life story... a story that ranges from her childhood in Texas to a year in Israel and then to Florida. Along the way there was a college degree in sociology, marriage and children. Then the stroke at age 31, and years of rehab... all recorded into the Lingraphica. And, lest we think that Denise has lost her sense of humor, she has sprinkled in sentences like this one:
How was Denise's life story written? Together she and Andi did an outline with key words on paper. Then the SLP left her patient to work on the Lingraphica independently. Once Denise had the sentences programmed in, Andi came back, filled in some missing words, and fixed the grammar and syntax.
In spite of having lost her catering business due to the stroke, Denise continues to be interested
in cooking, and keeps lists on her Lingraphica of the contents of her spice rack, her pantry, and
her fridge in order to put
together recipes. As Andi
will tell you, "she can tell
you five ways to make
meatloaf."
Congratulations Denise.
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