Now that she is nearly 4 and gaining more awareness of her scoliosis, she is really starting to vocalize her wants and dislikes. I like that she can, it helps me help her.. even more than I ever could before. She kept telling me last week that she didn't want to take it off. This is the first time she's said that, and it took me back a little. But I think I understand why, although she can't vocalize this in her own words, yet. This is her 7th cast, and she's spent more of her life IN a cast than outside of one. The cast has become sort of a 2nd skin to her and it supports her back. It's apart of who she is, weather we like it or not. I think she feels so unsupported and "noodle like" when she's not wearing her cast. To be honest this is the first time that I MYSELF have NOT wanted to remove her cast. I never thought I could feel that way. Every other cast, I have been SO anxious and excited to see the hunk of plaster come off! The last time we removed her cast, we did so.. two days earlier than planned (to let her be cast free for Christmas) and that back fired on us. She regressed a couple of degrees and David and I both felt SO guilty for letting her out even 2 days earlier. Her Orthopedic Dr. wants her out of the cast for a even 7 days, no more, no less. Today, makes 12 weeks inside this cast and marks exactly 7 days until she gets her 8th cast. We most definitely knew that she would not come out any sooner than 7 days, before her next cast.
If she didn't need a MRI tomorrow morning, I would be fine with only giving her 3 days out of cast.. this time. Seems crazy to read that right? It's just that, it's so hard to watch her spine slowly go back to it's original curve ( of 45 degs) and to constantly wonder how much worse is it getting while she's out every day. So it's safe to say that neither one of us wanted her cast to come off today! But, her poor little skin needs to breath and get some lotion soaked up into it. She took a warm bubble bath and was in heaven :) I'm sure she'll take 2 a day.. and that's awesome. We are getting plenty of our squishy hugs from our girl and we are so happy!
Again, tomorrow she goes in at 10:30 AM at Childrens Hospital for her MRI. This is to check on things from her last surgery in June. Please continue to pray that her results would be clean and that her little spine would stay under control during this week. THANK YOU, for caring for my sweet little girl. Your prayers are what gets us through! :)