Et Tu Brute?

I still owe and plan to make good on the surgery clean up from a couple weeks ago. There is much to be said about that. But in less than 12 hours, Thomas goes under the knife again, and hopefully for the last time for the foreseeable future. This one makes us all a little nervous, especially Rebecca (she's a mom, so she says its ok).

I think I've mentioned that Thomas has a tethered spinal cord (if not, I just did and we'll move on). A tethered spinal cord is not as bad as it might seem I guess. Basically babies' spinal cords are not fully developed. At the end of the cord are a bunch of nerve endings floating free in a sack of fluid. That sack of fluid can sometimes adhere itself to something else down there. As it happens, this is fairly common with Preemies (I swear, we really should have gotten one of them regular babies). If nothing is done about it, as a baby grows, the spinal cord gets stretched and, needless to say, nothing good comes of it. So the thing to do is go in and untether it.

This procedure is obviously dealing with the spinal cord, so a neurosurgeon performs it. Now the good thing is, as far as procedures a neurosurgeon performs, this is a relatively minor procedure. There is a cyst on the cord that he wants to check out, but all in all, we should expect about 4 hours in the OR, where they will stab him in the back (hence the clever title). From there he/we will spend 2 to 3 days in the hospital recovering. Then he should be completely back to normal. I know Rebecca would appreciate any prayers and well wishes that you can throw Thomas' way tonight and tomorrow. I will update things tomorrow, and maybe get caught up on other blog items.

Mike