It has been a while since I posted, but, other than chronic recurring infections, there hasn't been much news until now.

Chris's Plastic Surgeon did a scan, but only of the bone to make sure that there wasn't any infection there. That came back OK.

His Head and Neck surgeon has a full scan scheduled for Jan. 2, 2009. She wants Chris to start Hyperberic Oxygen treatments, but has to make sure there isn't any cancer lurking around first. He has not truly healed. The infections keep coming back and he has been on antibiotics more than he has been off them in the past five months.

He recently tried to "tough one out", hoping that it was just a bad case of swelling and not an infection, but after a week of extreme pain, and not being able to sleep more than 2 hours at a time, he told me Friday when I got home from work to plan to take him to the Emergency Room in the morning. We have been thru this so many times, that I just got on the phone to the Surgeon's office and told them what the situation was and that if they didn't want to call in an RX for antibiotics, then we would see the doc in E.R. on Saturday. His RN not only called it in but also gave us 2 refills and told us that the doc wanted to keep him on antibiotics until the next surgery.

This surgeon had not yet been informed of the HBO treatements that the other surgeon is planning to do. Hopefully, after those, the antibiotics will not be needed routinley.

He will still need another Free Flap surgery, but that won't be for at least 3 more months.

I have been reading a lot about other people's treatment issues, and have found that I am turning into a reverse Internet Hypochondriac. I read issues that other people are having and think - Chris has that too..... maybe I can give some advise, but then I find myself replying and just listing all of his problems and no help or solutions or advise for the poster. So, I am using this quick update to get that out of my system.

This New Year will bring more challanges, but when I look back on what we made it through in 2008, I know we will be able to face 2009 -- one day at a time, one problem at a time.

Happy 2009 to everyone.

Karen