A Very Late Update on Tommy

It's Tommy's 12th birthday today, and I happened to get an email from someone who had stumbled across the blog while researching AMPS, asking what had happened to Tommy. I cannot believe it has been four months since my last post, which was written while Tommy was still in the treatment program at Children's Mercy.  I have lots to share about how Tommy is doing now.

He is absolutely great! Seriously.  I cannot describe how well he is feeling, and how happy and thankful we are to have our little boy back.  He graduated from the program after four weeks of intense treatment, and we came back home and enrolled him (nervously) into school full time.  He only had 3 weeks left of school, and we enrolled him in four weeks of summer school as well.  He did so well! He went to full days of school and in addition did all of his assigned exercises and stretches once he got home. During summer school, he rode his bike to school, which is a mile away, and his stamina was astounding.

We took him back up to Kansas City for his one month follow up appointment, and the doctors sang his praises.  They repeated some testing that they had done while he was in the program, and they said his progress was phenomenal.  I was so relieved and so proud.

The physical strength and healing that he experienced was wonderful and such a huge relief to all of us, but one of the wonderful things about going through this treatment was being able to see Tommy's personality come back. He is happy again. Once again our home is filled with the squeals of aggravated sisters as Tommy is back in full-time pestering mode.  My front yard is littered with nerf swords and footballs, and Tommy is once again running around with the neighborhood boys. It is like a weight has been lifted off of our shoulders.

We took Tommy out to the IMAX theater to see Guardians of the Galaxy for his birthday this weekend.  I was remembering all of those months that our family couldn't even go on a fun outing like that due to Tommy's pain and inability to leave the house for so long.  I had tears in my eyes watching him laugh and enjoy himself with his family.  

Tommy started 6th grade last week, and he is feeling great.  He still has some pain from time to time, and he has a tiny bit of sensitivity around his collarbone, but overall he has just made such an amazing recovery. We are so thankful and so grateful to God for his healing, and for bringing us to Children's Mercy.