Monday, September 22, 2008

I am lazy so. . . .

I'm ripping off this post from the carepages update. So there.


Brody is doing very well. We never did find out what the random fever was about - it literally disappeared with no other symptoms ever appearing. It was yet another lesson in learning to concentrate on what we can and cannot control.


Brody is enjoying the fall. We just had a wonderful weekend in Dillon, CO with my mom and stepdad. Brody got to go in a canoe and go swimming. He loves to "dive" into our arms from the side of the pool. We are still working on going underwater. He thinks it's hysterical to splash everyone else, but gets quite upset when someone splashes him and gets water in his face.


Brody is also now in the 2 year old room at daycare. This means that instead of playing with the 1 year olds and infants during the early morning and afternoons, he plays with the "big" kids in the 3s and 4s rooms. Last week I went to pick him up and he was playing with a couple of 4 year old girls and another boy. They asked me what was wrong with his arms and pointed to his scars. I told them he had surgery to make his hand straight and that he would soon have surgery to make his fingers into thumbs and wasn't that cool? It seemed like they didn't realize he didn't have thumbs, so I explained he wasn't born with thumbs. And of course, being children, they asked why. I said no one knew, they just didn't grow. One girl said, "Yeah, we saw he didn't have thumbs when we were playing outside. But Susie (the other little girl) thought he didn't have thumbs because he was poor." After stifling my laugh, I said "No, he's not poor. He just doesn't have thumbs." The minds of children.


Anyway, on to the next steps for our little man.


Esophagus:We noticed over the summer that Brody was having trouble eating certain things (mostly soft things, like noodles, or slippery things, like fruit). Our gastroenterologist said the dilation surgery he had in March might last 4-8 weeks. Well, we got a few more months out of the surgery than that. But we now believe - since he is having all of the same symptoms (severe hiccuping followed by vomiting) - that the stricture is narrowing again. Luckily, Brody's doc did not make us come in for an appointment to confirm this. A few phone calls, and we actually have a surgery date of next week, Thursday October 2 at Children's in Denver. The dilation is an outpatient procedure so he won't have to stay overnight in the hospital which is beyond lovely. The dilation is an hour long procedure, with 2 hours in recovery. Please send any prayers or good thoughts you have that Brody stays healthy and that the surgery goes well. Some kids with tracheoesophageal fistula have to have weekly or monthly dilation surgeries, so one or two a year is not so bad.


Hands:Today we just received confirmation today that the surgery on Brody's right wrist and thumb will be in January. Then the plan will be to do the left thumb in March. The only way we could get in October would be to demand that they cancel other patients' surgeries and do ours first. We didn't want to take the karmic risk of that, plus the guilt would probably kill us. Jeremy will have a brand new year of leave time, and I will hopefully have some time built up and it will be nice to have a break from traveling for surgery. We can just concentrate on a nice holiday season without surgery.


And the more I think about it, the more I understand that it will not truly matter in the long run. I watched Brody coloring with some 3 and 4 year olds the other day. His drawings look just like the 3 and 4 year olds (ok, yes, Brody's drawings were better but I'm trying to sound unbiased). He holds pens and crayons just fine and he loves to eat with forks and spoons (he recently tried to eat a grilled cheese with a spoon). Adding thumbs will only make his life that much easier.
Finally, because of this fine organization, the Littlest Heroes Project, Brody, Jeremy and I are having a photo session this weekend with this wonderful photographer, Jamie Marie.

So if you know any kids who are dealing with some medical issues, illness, etc, urge them to the Littlest Heroes Project website. Amazing stuff.

1 comment:

Dawn said...

I LOL about the no thumbs because he was poor!! Kids are so funny and innocent!
I hope your surgeries next year go well without any problems, and in the meantime, I think Brody's fine motor skills are probably much better than Zaydens. He doesn't like to use a spoon/fork, and his drawings look like a 6 month olds. ;)