Casts Off

Anna's procedure went well and we are all home resting up. The trip was long but good- I rode in the Shr*ners van and stayed right at the hospital. It was really convenient this way. I pulled my back out a week or so ago and then re-pulled it the day before, so I was not looking forward to taking this trip solo but I tried to pack really light and brought this for Anna to sleep in instead of the pack n play:

It's a Kidco pea pod tent- a gift from my parents a while back. It has a little inflatable mattress that goes inside, and it folds up to become the lightest thing you will ever see. Anna slept 12 straight hours without a peep. Nice.


Good choice because I ended up lugging our bags around and didn't mess my back up from it. The timing of the arrival was great as Anna went to bed fairly soon after we arrived. I stayed up and watched The Voice thanks to the pleasant surprise of cable in the room. I had some major trouble sleeping- not as bad as the night before the first surgery where I didn't sleep a wink, but it took a while to fall asleep. I kept kicking myself for telling my mom several months ago that she didn't need to come down. Despite being 8+ hours away and having a bit of an aversion towards hospitals following my father's coma and death, she was ready to be there at 6:30am to give emotional support, and I was feeling like I desperately needed it at that point. But I tried to view it as an opportunity to be a full fledged grown up. I think I stood up to the plate well- we only had two minor catastrophes the two days :)


Anna went under anesthesia at 8am and came out at 8:45am. She was not happy, but it was easier this time because she wasn't on any pain meds. I ended up in the same room as this really great woman from Florida and we talked pretty much the whole time. I was very thankful for the company. She flies in from Tampa every 8 weeks for her 3-year-old daughter to undergo surgery and receive a new full torso cast for her infantile scoliosis. My heart really went out to her for everything she has to go through- I think she said this was her eleventh surgery! I can't imagine. I was so thankful that Anna only needed her cast on for 6 weeks. The hospital was wonderful and all the staff were top-notch. Anna received a special toy and a new outfit for her Build-a-Bear, per tradition. I thought I wanted to go locally for her first prosthetic but now I'm not so sure. Side note: why didn't I ever think to go into prosthetics? It would have been such a great career field. My mind goes back to all those people in India who couldn't walk because they didn't have a prosthesis. Can I go back in time please?


Anna is doing great. Only one more day with the bandage and then she can go in the pool and bathtub. Two weeks wearing a compression sock and then we go back to have her leg checked and see if she is ready to be casted for her prosthesis. She is already putting weight on her left leg. I was pleasantly surprised to see that it isn't much shorter than her right, so she can still stand and cruise around. She still drags her leg along as if she had her cast on, which is pretty funny.

Anna dropped two diaper sizes (stress? burning off tons of calories?) and she is a skinny-mini. It's so strange to hold her without the cast! We are already thoroughly enjoying the lack of cast complications.
We are relishing in the following:

12 hours of sleep that is uninterrupted from bursts of crying and wet casts.
The ability for her to sit up- we don't have to hold her up for everything.
No more hijacking my blow dryer back and forth from drying Anna in her nursery to drying my hair in the bathroom.
She can fit comfortably again in her carseat and highchair.
Going back to our cloth diapers.
She can wear ANYTHING now! Yay!
She no longer smells like urine from the cast lining.
She can take a bath and get in the pool. Hooray!
I can take her outside when it's hot because we don't have to worry about her getting a rash.
I can feed her all the messy foods she hasn't been able to have- including her favorite, spaghetti.

The last six weeks have been some of the hardest of my life. I am going to go ahead and say they were the hardest. But it just makes the joy of the present that much more. Hooray!