shawnie's cast

On November 18, Keith, Shawnie, and I headed down to Salt Lake for an orthodontist appointment and to be admitted to Shriners hospital for her rissor cast. It ended up pretty much being her worst nightmare of a trip. The orthodontist surprised us and said that her palate expander had over-expanded so he was going to take it out for a while. He started to pull it out, and she got really upset that it was hurting so bad. All of a sudden it came loose, and the molar that it was attached to was still attached to it. He had pulled out her tooth! The only molar she had on that side of her mouth and it was gone, just like that. He felt terrible, he said it must have been ready to come out but he normally numbs it first. Go figure. He also gave us a palate expander for the bottom teeth. Normally he glues them in, but he was worried that it's going to cut her mouth and tongue to shreds with the lack of control that she has of her tongue and her susceptibility to cankers, so he wanted us to be able to take it out. He put it in and she was absolutely miserable, just depressed and uncomfortable and sore and frustrated. When we got to the parking lot at Shriners we decided that it was rediculuous to put her through all of this at the same time, so we popped it out and it hasn't made its way back in yet.
The rissor cast procedure was just as bad as she was afraid it would be. The night before the procedure, we met with the doctor for the first time. It was here that he informed us that his intent was not just one, but two 3 month castings for a total of 6 months in her cast. This puts us into April instead of February. Then, if all is well, she will go into a special back brace for a couple of years until she has stopped growing enough to put the rods in her back. Her scoliosis curve was at 70-80% when we were admitted. During the procedure, after anesthesia had set in, they put her in traction and twisted her straight, then casted her at that point. Afterwards, they did an x-ray and found that they had reduced her curve to 30%. This is incredible and they were very pleased with their work, but in the meantime, Shawnie's little body that was used to being contracted was now expanded beyond it's capacity. Her back and tummy and hips have really struggled with it. Now, two weeks later, she is still really having a hard time. They have decided that she needs to be seen again, because I guess this is abnormal, so on Wednesday this week she goes in for a check-up. She has been totally depressed. She says she doesn't even look like Shawnie anymore. This afternoon, as with every afternoon, she got weepy about the "dumb cast". She wants to know why she has to go through it if she's going to have to have the rods in the end, anyway. I don't even know what to tell her. Her friends at school have been so supportive, though. Her teacher is making all the students in the class sit up with their shoulders back to make her feel better. A boy in her class said she looks cool, "like a football player." Me, I still think she is "superwoman" and can't believe the endurance that she always pulls through with. Her testimony is getting stronger even as her morale is getting weaker. I wish I could take this away more than anything else in the world, but I know that she is who she is for a reason, and she'll be blessed for her strength in trials in the end.