We have seen articles about brain plasticity that say this plasticity continues even for adults. We saw something, I think on the science channel, about a woman who had a stroke and in some ways she got better and it was like the other side of her brain took over, but she was not the same person she was before the stroke and her abilities had changed.
I think he might have more trouble than the average person believing in the possibility of creating new neural pathways because his once very smart grandmother who lives next door to us came out of minor surgery 6 years ago with large parts of her memory wiped out and with only about 30 seconds of short term memory. We couldn't see any evidence of brain plasticity or growing new neural pathways, as she only continues to get worse. My uncle, who also lives near us, had a stroke and some things got better, but others did not.
I think from my son's perspective, it must seem like he has to do a lot of work for a very small chance that things might improve. He wonders why he didn't grow these new neural pathways with piano lessons and dance and other things that he tried already. He told his dad that he thought he could do just about anything his friends could do physically but he would be just a little slower and he wouldn't be able to do it as long and he is okay with that. He says his disability doesn't really cause any problems in the things he wants to do, since he was never that interested in sports, so it is really hard to convince him to do some of the things I want him to do, especially when all of his public schooled friends are on summer break.
