Greetings from the beautiful Columbia, Missouri....

I realize I haven't posted in a few days, it's been a little crazy here.  Jeremy continues to tolerate the traction well, his spine is responding and his spinal cord is dong great.  We are up to 14 pounds and not sure if we are holding here or going to 15 pounds.  We did have a rough few days Wednesday and Thursday, with each increased pound Jeremy became more irritable so we changed his pain meds on Thursday which helped Jeremy.  Thursday was the worst day, Jeremy was in pain, didn't want to come back to the room, I had walked around the entire 5th floor with him, throwing the ball, got a little break and I was so exhausted.  I can't remember being that tired, so when he almost tipped over the wheelchair I had a meltdown.  Child life set with him and I went outside and walked and cried my eyes out.  I felt like a bad mom for not being more patient with Jeremy, when he was in pain and in a situation he didn't understand.  Once the pain meds were changed he was back to being himself.  Dr.Dan did the  CT scan on Thursday.  The plan is for Jeremy to have his spinal fusion surgery this Friday, January 28.  Dr. Dan feels that Jeremy's spine has responded to the traction and is relaxed and stretching. His other concern was the khyposis fusion we did this past summer, it was intended to go along with the spinal fusion that we all know didn't happen.  Dr. Dan felt with the last set of X-rays that it had set in and wouldn't be flexiable but with the CT scans he said it was flexiable so that is good news.  He feels that he can get some correction with J's spine not a 100% but I never expected that starting out.  He does plan to get the lower fixed so that it will fix J's leg length difference and he won't have to wear a shoe lift the rest of his life.  He is going to compare the one we did Thursday with the one we did last year and see how much of a difference.  We have been here for 11 days, everyone is awesome with J.  Jeremy is the ruler of the 5th floor pediatrics, made lots of new friends who really care about him.