Sorry for the unexpected blogging hiatus!

Sorry we haven't updated in so long! Mom has had a very up and down past few weeks and I have been helping and taking care of her. Cold makes Mom's pain worse and it has been abnormally cold here in North Carolina these past few weeks (we've had more snow this year than we have in the past 5ish years combined!). She also has a bad immune system so she caught a virus and bronchitis (which is very bad when you have asthma) and was stuck in the house for a week and a half!
She did have time to modify my backpack to make it easier for her to put on me (her condition is still deteriorating). My pack used to have snap buckles like a collar that were getting too hard for Mom to close with one hand. So she replaced them with some D-rings and pink webbing (my backpack is a bit drab) and heavy duty velcro.

We finally got to go back to volunteering at the spay and neuter clinic! Mom loves helping them out and I like getting to go to new places with her and make sure she stays safe and healthy. Mom says she is lucky to have me because I can also alert to when her pain level is going to spike. This happened on Thursday and Mom was able to get her pain meds and call Grandmom to come pick her up before it got really bad.
We did get some good news this week! Mom went to this place called Duke and met a new doctor who is sure he can help her. She is going to have a sympathetic nerve block March 11 (unless there is a cancellation before that) that will tell the doctor for sure if she has Complex Regional Pain Syndrome. After that, they are going to do a trial run with something called a Spinal Cord Stimulator that should reduce Mom's pain level a lot! We are all very excited that we found a doctor who listens to Mom AND wants to figure her out (he even walked in and told her she was a mystery, which most doctors aren't willing to admit). I will even get to be part of everything since I can detect Mom's pain spikes and that will let them know if the SCS is working right or not!
Lola has some exciting news too, but I will let her talk about that tomorrow :-)