Eight is Enough

I know, I know. This was probably the most predictable title I have ever used. It just seems appropriate.

We got home from Japan on Tuesday night and Wednesday morning Jo went to see Dr. Alvarez to get the okay to head into surgery. Jo's platelets had dropped below 100,000 and her white blood cells had dropped to an unacceptable level for surgery. 9 and 12 hour plane flights definitely take a toll on the body and this will be something I will run past the NIH doctors when we see them this spring.

On our way to the hospital today, we stopped to get Jo's blood checked again and her white cells had come up to 3.8. Dr. Alvarez had wanted them to get above 4, but Dr. Kelly felt that 3.8 was good enough. At 1:45pm, Jo went into the operating room for her 8th surgery in less than 25 months. Dr. Kelly said that everything went perfectly and she expects a total success.

Jo's ball joint in her right shoulder had collapsed - think of taking your thumb and making a dent in a Styrofoam ball. Dr. Kelly scraped out the area of collapsed bone and replaced it with a metal "button". This button is a piece of metal that can be expanded to be the exact size of the area Dr. Kelly created and that small section of shoulder bone is essentially resurfaced. The end result is the shoulder bone once again having the proper shape to move normally in the socket.

Jo is expected to come home tomorrow around noon. She will have help from my mom for the next two weeks and then her mom until mid-January. By then we expect Jo to be completely pain free with somewhere close to 95% or more range of motion in all of her joints.

Two years ago, I remember sitting in Dr. Kelly's office and she told us not to think too far into the future. She said, "The reality is I could schedule you for 2 full years of surgery." At the time I didn't believe her. I believe her her now.