What has Crosby been doing while waiting? Learning new things! His latest achievements are all related to mobility - learning to get around the floor with his commando crawl as you saw in the last blog entry and around the room with his walker. Of course Mom takes plenty of video to share with Crosby's Team!
We had Crosby (plus Wes and Corbin) outside in the sunshine yesterday to try out the new wheels courtesy of Patty Morris (we really appreciate and USE all of the fun toys she's given Crosby over the last 15 months!) We found out he can also wheel around the living room and really enjoys the new perspective. The walker will do a good job strengthening those legs for more milestones to come.
I also get asked if Crosby is still top on the list for new livers? The answer is probably not. I looked at the latest data today and here's what I found: 488 kids under the age of 18 are waiting for livers today in the United States. 112 of them have PELD scores of 25 or more. Our region (8) has 7 kids waiting with scores of 25 or more. St Louis Children's alone has 3 (including Crosby) with scores that high. View the Waiting List for Organs Crosby's blood type is O+ which is the most common blood type - that's good! But it's also bad because type O livers can also be used by type A, B, AB, and O recipients. This link How Do Livers Get Allocated? takes you to an informative article describing how the allocation process works.
So.... I'm not at all confident of a call coming soon. However, the list can move very quickly and a liver that will work for one child will not work for another. Just because a liver is offered does not make it the perfect liver. So that creates a great big question mark for planning around the Hoots' Household.
One very important thing Crosby's Team continues to do while waiting is raise funds for the Children's Organ Transplant Association in honor of CrosbyH. This allows us to save for the rainy (expensive!) days ahead. All funds are earmarked for Crosby's use before, during, and after transplant.
See the photos and videos below of the recent "Shave a Redneck" fundraiser organized by Alan and Mindy Remmert of Stonington, IL. Those rednecks raised a whole lotta money with that hair!!! We had lots of fun and really appreciated everyone coming out to support COTAforCrosbyH!!
Above photos: LEFT - Kit Mahan CENTER Meadow and Crosby RIGHT - Alan Remmert
Below Video: Crosby's Aunt Jennifer giving a redneck makeover - looking good Kit!
As always, thank you for the daily well wishes! We hope to see you all on April 23rd at Buffalo Wild Wings Forsyth location and May 19th at all Decatur Monicals locations as they donate a % of sales to COTAforCrosbyH.
