On the Move

Where do we even begin to recount all of Monday's events without getting bogged down in detail?

Meaghan had her radiation planning/mapping session. This took a little over one hour. All of the measurements of her mold will be sent to RI for a quality assurance check. Meaghan is slated to begin her radiation on December 7th, if not sooner. Also, her full spinal MRI is on Friday (keep that in your prayers). Here's an interesting bit of information: she has several pinpoint tattoos at various junctures on her trunk. These permanent tattoos are required to maintain precise delivery of radiation.

In typical Meg fashion, she took her time come around from the sedative and was generally quite irritable for the rest of the day. Not even a visit from Ethan and Maddy could raise her spirits.

Meaghan will be transferred to Children's Hospital for intensive inpatient rehab. She will stay a minimum of three weeks, receiving a minimum of three hours per day of therapy: speech, physical, occupational and recreational. We are excited for her because she needs it. We are hoping to get her transferred at some point Tuesday, otherwise we might be looking at going next week because of the holiday. The social worker and case workers just need to do the dance with the insurance company. Pray common sense prevails and we can expedite this. The stronger we can get her before radiation begins the better. We really enjoyed our conversation with the chief pediatric rehabilitation medicine doctor. The man speaks with common sense.

We've met with Meg's case worker and a bunch of really wonderful support staff. They listened to our concerns and we feel we've been heard. We have a high-level overview of the direction we're headed toward.

All Ed and I can do is continue to pray, try not to take our frustrations out on one another, and follow-up on all the plans in play for Meaghan.

Please continue to pray for Madison and Ethan. While Ethan doesn't articulate his struggles they break through nonetheless. Let me paraphrase some words from Madison: I'm too tired to be this angry anymore. Now, I'm just sad. I don't want to be a trooper anymore.

Just meditate on her words, they're a pretty good window into both of their struggles, heck all of our struggles.