Broken arm chronicles part 3 October 24, 2008

Today was her second visit with the orthopedic doctor.  He did some xrays again and said that really everything looks about the same.  Still 2 fractures.  1 chip fracture near the growth plate and the other a buckle (or compression) fracture in the other lower arm bone.

But the good news is……………..no more splint!!!  Believe it or not!  It pays to be 3 sometimes!!  He said that with her type of fractures it is worse to leave them splinted as the arm starts to become stiffened.  She already had some stiffening present when he took the splint off. 

Here is the hard part……….keep a 3 year old sorta quiet for the next 2 weeks!  I would say that he must not have little kids but in reality he does.  

Next appointment in 2 weeks for more xrays and recheck to make sure it is healing correctly.

Thickener trashing party!!!! October 24, 2008

Once we got the OK from the swallow study that Jennifer didn’t need thickened liquids anymore we decided to have a thickener trashing party!!  It is so expensive that I did have a hard time just throwing it away but at the same time after having to use it for about 1 1/2 years it felt good too!  Jennifer enjoyed herself too!!

This first pic is her showing the can of thickener:This one is harder to tell what is happening because of the way she did it but it is of her pouring the thickener into the trash:Unfortunately with the delay on the digital camera I didn’t get the next pic of her jumping up and down clapping her hands!!!  What a happy moment for us!!

Broken arm chronicles part 2 October 21, 2008

This is quite the late update but Jen’s appointment went fine last Friday with the orthopedic doctor. He looked at her xrays and said that her 2 fractures were pretty small and that she was a lucky little girl all in all.
For now it stays in the splint and ACE wrap and she can wear the sling as she wants (but what toddler wants to!!!!) And then we go back on this coming Friday to have xrays done again and go from there.
Here is a picture of her with her splint on:

She has gotten used to it as you can plainly see!

Oh and I got an email from the GI doc and for now they aren’t worrying about her height since it is consistent with the 2 year one. I guess they really look at what they start doing after age 2 and so they will follow from here. She does want her remeasured in about 3 months though

Broken arm chronicles part 1 October 17, 2008

I have some news that everyone who has been following Jennifer’s story will not be expecting to read here.

Jennifer has a fractured arm. She slid down the slide at daycare and decided instead of getting off the end she would roll off the side. But instead of landing right she landed on her arm. The daycare thought it was maybe just bruised but with as much as she was complaining about it they took her to our urgent care center and sure enough it was fractured. Both of the lower arm bones near the elbow.

For now she is in a splint with an Ace wrap and a sling. She will see an orthopediatist later today at 2pm for an evaluation to see what further treatment she will need. I’ll update again after that.

Here is what she looked like the day she did it.  She was in quite a bit of pain.  Today she is much better.

 

Latest ENT/GI visits October 14, 2008

Today was Jennifer’s next appointments with her doctors in Boston. She saw both ENT and GI. The visits went very well.

ENT: He is happy with how well she is doing. Said all looks great and she progressed quite fast after the surgery getting onto the thin liquids. The fact that she does still cough some when drinking is fine and that should slowly go away with more time as her body continues to learn how to swallow with her new anatomy. But no aspiration by swallow study is great news. He doesn’t want to see her for a year unless things change. If at a year things still look so great then he will officially discharge her from his service!!!

GI: We talked about how much Jen is still refluxing and how it’s actually hard to tell. Jen tells me at some point everyday that her tummy hurts. But she says that no matter what is actually bothering her. It could be her big toe but she’ll say it’s her ‘tummy’. And when she coughs (not while drinking) she almost always says it’s ‘on yuckys’ meaning that she refluxed. So we aren’t sure if she still refluxes or not. We are going to try cutting her prevacid to once daily now that the surgery site is all healed up though.

The mild fructose (sugar) intolerance seems to be getting better. Her theory is that she got it from some stomach bug and that she just needed time to heal her intestines. She’ll stay on the probiotic a bit longer until that is completely gone. No plans to retest currently.

Jen is handling soy lethicen and small amounts of soy oil currently. When I tried higher amounts of soy oil she was definitely refluxing so she wants me to stay where we are for 4 more weeks. Then try increasing the amounts of soy oil over 4-6 weeks. If she handles that fine then after that time period add in soy yogurt. If in 4 weeks she does ok on the soy yogurt then add in soy milk. By then it will be time to see her again. We are to NOT add in any dairy before seeing her again. She wants her tolerating soy well before even thinking about any form of dairy.

The only thing she is concerned about in Jennifer is her height. From age birth to 6 months she steadily increased in height to catch up from being born early. Then from 9 months until 18 months she was 50-75% in height on the growth charts. But all the sudden at age 2 she dropped to 15% and then at age 3 to 8%. All this time her weight has been steadily 50%ish. (Well not at birth!! Hee Hee!) But she said it is highly unusual for a child to drop percents in height only. Usually children will drop in weight only or wt and height together but rarely in height alone. For this reason she will probably have her evaluated by an endocrinologist to see if there is an underlying reason for this drop in height.

All in all that’s the visit. 1 year until ENT again and 4-5 mos until GI again. Mostly good news.

Surgery was a success……..she passed!!!! October 10, 2008

Yesterday was Jennifer’s post-op swallow study. It has been almost 3 months since her surgery to fix the laryngeal cleft. Ready for the results………………………..

NO ASPIRATION!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

It was perfect!! For those who would understand this part:  there was no penetration either!!! No silent aspiration, no nothing. 

She is fixed!! Dr. Rahbar is the BEST doctor in the whole world!!

After such a long journey I never thought we’d see this day. I had such doubts and trials. The decision to do the surgery was not an easy one and the second guessing was huge but in the end it turned out to be the right one after all. Thanks to the Lord!!

The update is coming today as yesterday was quite the adventure!! Her test was at 2pm. We got back there about 2:20 and it literally took about 5 minutes!! A usually swallow study test takes longer but they only needed to see if she was safe for the liquids. When we got done we had to go and see all the ’sights’ meaning all the things she loves at Boston Children’s. The bubbles, the lobster, the balls and especially the garden. We even brought bird food to feed the birds in the garden this time! We could have rushed out of there and gotten right home but the day before when I told her we were going she asked if there would be any boo boos that day. I told her there wouldn’t be but at the same time I wanted to make it as positive an experience as I could. She’s already quite weary about anyone doing anything around her mouth so I just wanted positive.

By the time we got done with the sights and getting a snack it was 4pm. Had some trouble getting out of the parking garage and I’m pretty sure I got charged twice. Should have realized that was a forbearing of the rest of the trip home! I went the wrong way into a toll booth and ended up on the wrong highway. That added 20 min to the trip. Then I missed my exit to get onto the last highway and this one wasn’t as easily corrected. We ended up having to eat dinner on the road and taking a back road to get to the highway we needed. This second mistake ended up adding 1 1/2 hours to the trip!!!! So a 2 hour trip home ended up taking nearly 4 hours!!!

But in the end not much could burst my bubble! I was riding on cloud 9. I can do that trip in my sleep. I think I was just riding on a natural high and driving along thinking about how I never thought she’d get to this day and then ‘Oh there’s my exit’!!!!

Here is a pic of her getting ready to have the swallow study done:

And another of her out in the garden enjoying the birds:

Tomorrow is the day October 8, 2008

Tomorrow we go back to Boston to find out if Jennifer’s surgery was a success.  She will have her post op swallow study.  It will have been almost 3 months since her surgery.  (I think it will end up being 2 months and 3 weeks to be exact).  

I’m nervously excited about it.  She’s been on thin liquids since this post and is doing well. She does still cough but more as a protection than choking like before the surgery.  And it is pretty infrequent.  I really do think the study will still show some penetration into her windpipe but no real aspiration.  I think when the penetration happens is when she coughs.  This is a huge step for her as it means that her body has started to recognize that fluids are coming there and triggers her cough reflex.  I *think* if this is all that’s happening then they will clear her to stay on thin liquids.  As long as there is no aspiration.

Another exciting thing about going tomorrow is that I will get to meet one of my online friends that has a kiddo with aspiration too!!  She found me through this blog and we have been emailing for a few months now.  Her daughter is today going for a G tube placement and to be scoped to see if she also has a laryngeal cleft.  Please say a prayer for them today.

A big day for us!!!! September 16, 2008

Does the picture say it all?  Yesterday was a HUGE day for us!!!

We actually went out to run some quick errands and so I didn’t bring anything for snack or to drink.  Jennifer was just whining and whining that she was firsty!  So, I stopped and got a juice and put some in a cup with a straw for her and for Sam.  I figured I’d pinch the straw so that she would only get a little as that works ok for her.  But, then I decided to see what she would do with it on her own.  She did wonderful!  Drank 6 oz of juice and only coughed once.

Later when we got home we tried again with this juice box.  She was so excited!  It was for sure a Kodak moment!!!  No cough at all this time.  She then drank thin oat milk for dinner.  Again no cough.  

Hopefully there is no silent aspiration accompanying this as that has been her big MO in the past too.  We’ll watch close for the low grade fevers I blogged about a week or so ago and go from there.  Next swallow study is in about 3 weeks.

Yipee!!!!!

I have a couple of 3 yo seals!! September 15, 2008

Croup has invaded our house!  Jen awoke with it last night around 1:25.  It always sounds so scary.  I cannot imagine what people thought before the age of modern medicine when croup’s description really got out there.  My first thought each time my kids awaken with it is:  oh gosh they cannot breath!!  Then I really wake and remember it’s only croup.  Outside we go and things improve dramatically.

Jen’s breathing sounds fine this morning but she is still doing the barking cough.  Sam, who slept fine, awoke with the barking cough this morning too.  Probably means we’ll be in for a rough night tonight.

So far Ben is spared.  Shouldn’t be much longer though!!!!

Wonderful new nondairy/nonsoy yogurt and ice cream September 5, 2008

I went to our local health food store the other day to get Jen some more yogurt and found that instead of just the usual rice based yogurt they now have a coconut based one.  It was a bit more expensive (about 40 cents more) but I figured worth a try.  Boy am I glad I gave it a chance.

It is wonderful!!!  Much richer and creamier than we are used to in a nondairy, nonsoy yogurt.  And the taste just cannot be beaten!!  

Jen ate only half but I think that is because it is so much richer in taste than she is used to.  I was happy to finish the other half which never would have happened with the rice based one!

We got a container of the chocolate ice cream too and she is loving that too!!  Here is a link to the company who makes it’s webpage.  They even have a coupon you can print for them!