An update from Tonya!

Tyler went to Lubbock yesterday and met with Dr. Griswald, he is Tyler's main doctor and is also head of the burn unit at UMC. He told Tyler he is a little reluctant to do surgery on his shoulder because Tyler's burn was so bad and so deep, that is is going to take his body 8 months to everyone else's 6 months to build up the elasticity in the skin. He told Tyler that he has never had a patient that had burns this bad ever actually live to make it to rehab, so he isn't quite sure what to expect. However, there has been little, if any, change in his shoulder in months. So, Tyler will meet with him again on the 18th, and they will make the decision about the surgery. If he decides to go ahead and do it, then it will be after the holidays, probably around the first part of January. The surgery will be a little more than we expected. They will go in and cut his shoulder and add skin to it. He will have to go to the burn unit again for 6 days with his arm in an airplane splint(this was one of Tyler's worst memories from his stay at the hospital). Then he will come home with the splint on and have to wear it for 2 weeks. It will be another miserable experience for Tyler, but at this point I think he is ready and willing to do whatever he has to to get back to normal