John's Health Update....

WOW! 

After packing up the baby to eat on the go and to be picked up on the go, packing school stuff for the kids, leaving dinner on the table for Auntie Marge, finishing up a swirl of work calls and e-mails, and making sure I was ready to go to, we left the house at 2:30 p.m. yesterday. By the time we arrived home, it was 8:30 p.m. and WHAT A WHIRLWIND it was in between!

MU --- got to MU by 2:55 p.m. waited and waited and waited (an ENTIRE 5 minutes!) for John to get done with work. He hopped in the car and we headed to

St. Luke's --- dropped John off 15 minutes early for his appointment he was in the office for 1 hour and 15 minutes! Meanwhile I sat in the car with 3 of our kids and Novenah, trying to feed Novenah while motivating our kids to do some school assignments [public note to self: do NOT even bring the schoolwork in the future! it is FUTILE and just FRUSTRATING and not all that beneficial to ANYONE!] When John returned back to the minivan he had

GOOD NEWS --- based upon evaluation of the MRI, Dr. Ahuja is recommending another round of Physical Therapy 2x per week for 6 weeks, cervical traction AND switching up John's muscle relaxers and NO SURGERY YET!  I immediately got on the phone with the

insurance company --- WWWWWWHHHHHHYYYYYY oh WWWWWWHHHHHHYYYYYY does everything have to be SOOOOOOOOOOOOO difficult???? fought with the voice-activated system which was going NUTS because my charges could NOT be silent and it kept hearing their noise and interpretting it as my selection. Finally got through that and waited on hold FOREVER to reach someone who said that my group number wasn't recognized by the voice-activated system (REALLY????? cuz I couldn't tell!) and then transferred me to the correct person. I then waited on hold for another ETERNITY to reach a different person who said, "I'm sorry your group number didn't transfer can I have it again?" So WHILE I WAS DRIVING found the number and repeated it to her [btw... isn't it nuts that I don't have that memorized after 3 years of this???] I explained to her I was trying to find out if this cervical traction device was covered only to find out without a billing code [which of course our Dr. didn't give us and by now of course his office was already closed so of course I could not get that] they couldn't tell me if it was covered.... WHILE all of this was going on, we were trying to coordinate Tanisha picking up Novenah which resulted in us pulling into not one but TWO different

McDonalds --- was dinner last night. Don't even get me STARTED on the expense/lack of nutritional value/etc of that choice... Easy won out last night! But we still didn't transfer the Novenah package. Headed QUICKLY to

My parents' house --- to drop off the kiddos to hang out there while we went to the chiropractor we were starting to run LATE AHHHHHHHHH!  Hurried over to the chiropractor with Novenah still tagging along.... Made it to

Dr. Hyatt --- digested a TON of information (a normal neck should have a 43 degree curve -- John's neck is almost straight up and down with only a 3 degree curve) the crux of which is Dr. Hyatt is (and in turn WE are) cautiously optimistic that he can help improve the curve of John's neck and decrease his pain level through chiropractic adjustments. [Novenah got picked up somewhere in here.] The 2 visits per week program we are embarking on will be a little costly BUT as I told John (and several other people afterwards) we can eat Ramen noodles every night for 9 months it helps John avoid another surgery! So John got adjusted last night, we picked up his new prescription, and the

End Results --- he is sore today, but optimistic. I can tell because he keeps starting sentences with, "When I get stronger," "After I get better," or "After a few months at the chiropractor,"....  We are STRICTLY following all doctor directives (iced 3x already, started new medicine regimen, kept rolling over all night long to make sure he was sleeping ON HIS BACK with his neck properly supported)... and for all of you

THANK YOU --- sooooooooo MUCH for your prayer support! We could feel you all carrying us through yet one more tough time in this journey. Keep on praying! It's working!