No more tube feed

For about a week now, Charbel has been eating only 'real' food, instead of his protein shake that was fed to him by the feeding tube. Since December mom has been feeding Charbel mashed and pureed food, as well as his tube feed. Now he can eat enough varieties of food in the mashed up and pureed form, that he no longer needs to be fed through the feeding tube at all! The feeding tube has not been removed yet, as we are still waiting for an extensive swallow test to be performed once he goes to rehab. I'm not exactly sure what the point is, since he can obviously swallow, and LOVES to eat, but the doctors want to make sure that everything is working properly before the tube is removed. Charb is still not able to eat solid foods, as his ability to chew is not great yet. Hopefully that will return with more practice.

On another equally important note: Charbel is 100% off all medications! Actually, he has been since late November, but for some reason we forgot to write about it. In November, he was only on one type of medication - to help with his spacticity and prevent seizures - but he was taken off this, and he has been taking absolutely no medication for the past 3 1/2 months. Once he is at rehab we will discuss with the doctors the possibility of medications that will help him concentrate better, but right now we are all very hesitant to start him on anything at this point.