One of the things that most upset Chris about needing surgery is that we had to cancel our long awaited trip to Canada to stay with my sister in Vancouver for Christmas.  It had been a year in the planning and we were all really looking forward to being with them on Christmas Day – but we’ve had to cancel that now.

In the last few weeks Chris has put up with a lot of different people examining his back and making him exercise and he has accepted it all without complaint.  Equally, his older brother has accepted without complaint that all of our attention is current on Chris!  I wanted to surprise them both with a holiday this half term as I think the whole family could do with a break from thinking about Scoliosis and spinal surgery.

We have looked online and chosen a five day tour of Iceland!!

I am so excited about it…we will swim in the Blue Lagoon, see waterfalls, gysers, volcanic lava fields, glaciers and icebergs…and hopefully (if we are lucky enough) we may even see the Northern Lights!

Today I had a meeting with Chris’ Tutor to talk about how much school he will miss as a result of the surgery and what we can do to try and help him keep up with all his lessons.  Mr Smith was incredibly supportive and he will speak to each of Chris’ subject teachers to find out whether there are any important GCSE tests/CAT’s that Chris will miss – assuming he has his surgery mid November or early December (we are still waiting for a date!)

At least we will have the Christmas holidays as part of his recovery time so that will be two weeks less school time that he will miss!

I am going to meet with Mr Smith again once all of Chris’ teachers have done a plan for the work he will miss and what he can do from home to try and keep up.