Adventures in Boston

Jaron and I got home yesterday from his clinic visit in Boston. We flew up Friday and went to straight to the hospital. His appointment was at 1:00pm.

We met with the dental team first to look at the position of his teeth and they reviewed his x-rays sent to them by our local dentist. We discussed a palate expander for Jaron and then Dr. Padwa came in to talk more about his bone graft surgery. She said


he does need the palate expanded and once it gets in the right position our local orthodontist will put a permanent device in to hold it in place and we can wait until after winter to do surgery. (we do not want to be in Boston in the middle of all that snow) So we discussed a possible surgery date in March. The speech therapist was very pleased with Jaron's articulation. When he gets the bone graft, Dr. Mulliken (plastic surgeon) plans to straighten Jaron's deviated septum and open up his left airway. But we are concerned that once his left nostril is cleared more air will escape his nose than already is and that will cause him to sound more nasal. So after lots of discussion we decided that when we go up in March we will try to schedule a speech study in an x-ray machine with barium in his nose watching him talk. They will be looking to see if Jaron's soft palate is long enough to connect to the back of his throat. And if not they can measure how much it needs to be lengthened. This procedure is call the p-flap surgery. It's not urgent but it will improve his speech and we might want to do that in the future. So the bone graft & deviated septum repair is about a 4 hour surgery and we will need to be in Boston a total of 10 days.

 

We are not sure if we will be able to fly all six of us up there and just make it our family vacation next year. Or if we will have to drive. If we do drive my concern would be Jaron having to sit in the car 18 hrs after having bone removed from his hip, he will be on crutches. It might be uncomfortable for him. The financial part can be overwhelming to think about. We will apply for assistance from Children's Craniofacial again once we get a surgery date set in stone. But they don't cover all the expenses. Our hotel alone will be about $2000. So we are praying and trusting that God will make a way when there seems to be no way. He has gotten us this far and always provided our needs and wants. So please help us pray for future travel expenses.

 

 This was actually NOT FUNNY when it happened but I laughed afterwards. I really thought I was getting sucked into the escalator!

 A man in the Atlanta airport gave Jaron a $20 peso and he wanted to exchange it for American money so he did and got $1.10.
After playing on the airport playground we met a little girl with the same birthday as Jaron (Monday) and they were on our flight.

So I guess she told the flight attendant and he announced to everyone "We have some special guests today on our flight and I need your help." He asked everyone to close their windows and turn on their overhead lights to act as candles. Then they all sang happy birthday to Jaron and the girl. So sweet and they made crowns for them to wear out of peanuts and pretzels and coffee stirrers. 

We are so thankful God protected us during this trip. Both flights had a lot of turbulence which is very disturbing and unnerving.